In This Place That We Meet
by EleanorKate
Summary: A chance for change and reconciliation? After the death of her mother, Chummy's father tries to forge links. NOW COMPLETE
1. Chapter 1

Something brushed her face. That delicate touch, skirting her cheekbone and down to her jaw, sent a spark straight to her heart and so did the missive that followed.

"Go on" she heard whispered in a male voice. "Wake Mummy up for me Freds. Go on".

The slight tickle was the pad of her son's index finger on her face, skimming gently. In some ways she was glad it was Freddie now feeling the weight of her son as he clambered onto her knee from where he had been sitting next to her on the settee, placed there moments earlier by her husband. If it was Peter she might have expected a good-natured shove or perhaps, at best, his lips on her neck and neither was she in the mood to reciprocate.

"Fred and I are going for a walk in the park. Are you coming with us?" he asked as Chummy opened her eyes flickering pupils against the afternoon light. She had fallen asleep in the ray of warmth and Peter had left her there.

"Do you mind if one doesn't" she replied, looking up at him holding Fred close who had now decided to rest his head on her chest and twirl the crucifix between his fingers. "I am not sure I have the strength".

"No, that's perfectly fine" Peter replied, sitting down next to her. "I thought we might buy dinner on our way back".

"To avoid eating what I cook?" she replied, knowing it was a standing joke now, even though her cooking attempts were actually far better than they were even a couple of months ago. Now, she didn't feel too bad with slightly charred or inordinately dry meat or vegetables that fell apart as soon as you lifted them from the pan. Thankfully she had mastered an Irish stew that disguised most of her happenings and close calls and her son's taste in food was anything that was placed in front of him.

_'He'll be so used to your cooking in the next few years anyway that he won't realise food tastes any different'_. Her husband had very nearly received a clip around the ear for that one. He would have had a clip around the ear if he had not been standing there on his second slice of home made apple pie, drowned in custard whilst she washed the dishes and she had feared it all over the floor.

"I was thinking you might not _want _to cook" Peter said as he frowned at her, bringing her back to reality. "You do look so pale, Camilla".

"Your child is sapping my energy" she replied with a smile as she sat up, straightening Freddie and her back the same time.

"Yes, but you weren't like this with him", he responded as their son objected to being shifted around from his comfortable spot on his mother's knee.

"Every pregnancy is different Peter" she replied, having seen far too many around her every single day to think otherwise. "I'll be bouncing around like nobody's business tomorrow, just you wait!"

Peter nodded, having heard that phrase yesterday too. "Did you speak to Sister Julienne?" he asked, knowing his last words to her this morning were to make sure she had a certain conversation.

"I did" she replied, head lolling back on the settee as her son continued to amuse himself. "She has agreed to reduce my hours to Tuesday days and Thursday afternoon clinics only. Just for the time being. Until I feel better" she concluded.

"Good" Peter replied. Whilst Freddie's brother or sister should not have been, and was not, a surprise, the shock was just precisely how debilitated she could feel and she could not help but wonder if that horrific birth had done some permanent damage to her bodies way of coping in sustaining new life. Short and sharp morning sickness with Freddie had not been repeated but those moments where nausea would jump at her, even now at almost six months gone, and catch her finding her rushing to the bathroom morning, noon and night. She would rather have had those three weeks in Sierra Leone of acute sickness that stopped on the walk to the Mission than this lingering sensation in her stomach that had persisted for months now. No matter how many hours of sleep she had, she could not shake the yawns and the weakness in her muscles and just exactly how much energy cycling a few miles stripped from her.

Chummy sighed as, as soon as she heard the door click shut behind her husband and son thinking that perhaps she should get together plates and cutlery, the telephone rang.

"Poplar 407" she announced.

"Chummy?" a male voice asked, deep, foreboding and decidedly familiar. The author of her nickname.

"What ho Pa" she replied, throat drying as a wave of nausea hit that was not, she was sure, entirely to do with her soon to be born second child. It had been over nine months since she had spoken to him to tell him when his wife's funeral would be. A funeral he failed to attend in all but a simple wreath of lilies and freesias. Chummy had mused at the time that this was nothing but a token and, whilst the news of another grandchild had been written in a letter, she had received no response.

"How are you?" he asked. Her father suddenly sounded quieter than she remembered him.

"Very well" she replied, smoothing her hand over the evidence of Fred's brother or sister. She was lying as she felt just terrible but the last thing she needed was a stilted conversation, trying to be familiar like a father and daughter should be, as they discussed her health.

"There is an invitation in the wilds of the postal service for you and your husband to come to Madeira" her father announced, thinking perhaps it was best to come straight to the point. "Tickets for the boat are with them".

"Oh!" Chummy replied, not thinking to ask why. "Alright".

"The housekeeper felt that I should also telephone you too" her father continued, "so it might not be too much one of those old surprises". Perhaps her father after all had realised the inordinate length of time since he had seen his youngest child but she would hope it would not take one of the staff to remind him.

"Yes Pa" Chummy replied. "What for?" she finally asked desperately trying not to sound as shocked as she was even with this telephone call to warn her. A request to go and see her father? Really? It set her mind racing as to why wondering for a moment if she might be told not to be asking questions that were not frankly her business.

"Just a get together for my family" he replied. "One has asked those brothers of yours as well although one does not expect them to appear even on such as day that it will be".

There was an uncomfortable pause, Chummy simply not knowing whether she ought to be reading into that comment or not.

"You will bring my grandson?" he asked.

"Really?" Chummy responded, voice speaking before her mind could catch up. Children. Not seen. Not heard. That was usually her father's attitude towards her when she was tiny and she had, for a moment, pictured herself dolefully kissing her son goodbye at Waterloo if Peter agreed with her to take up the invitation.

"I would like to see him", her father replied clearing his throat. "I am yet to see the boy in anything other than picture form and it would be…" He had lost the words he was looking for. "_Pleasant_ to see him".

"Yes of course we'll bring him" she said, voice softening. The last photograph she had sent Freddie had been barely six months old. Now, she had mused with some disbelief, that he was losing his 'baby' features and how time was quickly moving on turning her youngster into a proper little chap. Those aching arms when he wandered off from her, not wanting to be carried, would be filled again soon and she craved the warmth of the helpless body nestled close to her; a desperation that even demolished the fear of_ it_ happening again. Occasionally.

"You have been married how long?" her father asked.

"Nearly three years". Three years in four weeks if she was being precise.

"And the boy…my grandson… is how old?"

"He will be two in October", Chummy replied, sadness clear that her child's birthday seemed to pass her father by and that he had to ask. She could perhaps excuse the fact that he was one of fifteen grandchildren, sixteen if you counted the child slowing turning circles inside her for her father's failing memory, but somehow it felt a limp and pitiful justification for her father's lack of attention.

"Good" he replied. "Well, one does suppose that one had best….One is due to play golf shortly". She could almost picture him, pacing, fidgeting to put the telephone down.

"Yes Pa". Chummy replied, knowing he was going; knowing again that the conversation would not last.

"One will ensure a car is there for you at the port when you arrive".

"Thank you Pa", she replied, and with an awkward goodbye she placed the telephone back down herself, standing for what must have been a good proportion of a minute staring at the receiver. Even the swishing and swimming of of the child inside her could not distract her from wondering what on earth had prompted the telephone call and what in God's name they, as a family, had been invited to Madeira for.

How she wished that her first reaction was not suspicion.


	2. Chapter 2

The envelope was heavy, thick cream paper with what felt like a card inside. Addressed to 'Mr & Mrs Noakes' he had every right to open it right up but instead, having seen the postmark, Peter placed it on the kitchen table as the house creaked into life on what was looking to be a relatively nondescript morning.

He had left his wife and son asleep upstairs, but turned now to find her - _feeling_ her presence - still in her nightdress and housecoat, leaning on the door frame.

"Is that what I think it is?" Chummy asked quietly, hands crossed below the abdomen that had seemed to expand overnight.

"It looks like it", Peter replied, pouring boiling water into two tea cups. "I thought you might want to open it".

Chummy gave him a brief smile as she walked across the kitchen and sat down at the table, adjusting her housecoat around her middle, deliberately stalling, heart suddenly flickering out of time in anxiety. She felt a brief kiss to her cheek as her husband leant down, a cup of tea pushed in front of her. Chummy knew it was meant to be reassurance and with a short breath that Peter could not fail to notice, she peeled away the seal.

"Do you want something to eat?" Peter asked, not knowing if today might just be a good day.

"Let me see if this tea stays where its' meant to stay first" she joked, pulling out what looked suspiciously like an invitation. "Oh", Chummy uttered and the silence in the room became deafening. For a moment Peter didn't realise how quiet she had become.

"What is it?" he asked, walking up behind her, both hands onto her shoulders, thumbs pressing at the tightening muscles in her shoulder blades.

"Pa" she paused. "He's getting married again". The gentle weight on neck rested for a moment.

"He's what?" Peter asked, not sure he had heard correctly.

"Getting married" she repeated.

Two arms appeared over her shoulders, taking the invitation, as he felt her slump back in the chair, resting the back of her head on his belly.

_"__You are cordially invited to the wedding of Sir Rex Edgar Fortescue-Cholmondeley-Browne and Mrs Margaret Mary Hamilton on Saturday, 30__th__ September 1960 at Holy Trinity, Funchal, Madeira"_

Peter did not bother reading out the rest of the invitation, seeing his wife remove what looked like three boat tickets from the envelope.

"He's marrying the housekeeper" she stuttered, toying with the blue pieces of paper between her fingers.

"Housekeeper?" he asked, digesting the content of the missive.

"Mrs Hamilton. She's worked for them…." Chummy tried to remember. "Since I was about 19 I think. She must have got him to telephone" she added quickly.

Suddenly it struck her._ "Your father has many interests…I'm not one of them". _That unspeakable tea with Mater at the Savoy; she should have realised.

"It might only have happened after your mother died", he replied, spiriting the thought from her mind as the gentle pressure on his middle lifted as she righted herself.

"What if it didn't, Peter? What if he was…." It was the funniest thing that she actually felt tears well in her eyes and a sudden disconcerting, almost overwhelming sympathy for her mother. She could imagine that desperate hollowness, having felt it far too many times herself, albeit in different circumstances and perhaps for the first time, understanding why her mother might have fled Madeira. Just how alone she indeed was and when it came to it, just how alone Chummy too could have been.

"Camilla", Peter replied, sitting down before taking her hand. "If he was…..conducting himself that way while he was married to your mother, it's their business. You aren't the parent here".

"I know Mater could make rods for her own back, Peter, I'm not that naïve and I could see how he may have felt driven away. She did it to her own children enough, but …she hasn't been dead for a year yet!"

She slipped a hand over her mouth to stop herself bursting into tears. "It's not even been a year and I just thought she might have at least meant something to him that if something was going on with someone else, he would have waited at least a _respectful_ time..…".

"That doesn't mean it was happening before she died" he replied, arms engulfing her kissing her temple trying to reassure her. "People's feelings can change quickly". She felt another kiss. "How long was it from the moment we met to the day we married?"

"Six and a half months" she hiccuped from somewhere buried in his pyjama top. "But we were different", Chummy replied, withdrawing from his grasp. "You didn't have a dead wife or children and one can't simply ask him".

"Well, you know Ronnie wanted us to go and see them and the children for lunch one day. Ask her, or Bob. You know your Dad was closer to him than anyone else".

Chummy nodded. That was a good idea. Her brother and sister in law, now firmly ensconced in London too albeit in slightly more upmarket end, might just know.

"If Pa had mistresses when we were children we never knew about it, but she was so ill Peter. She had no-one to turn to". One thing that she never thought she would feel that way about her mother. To finally understand something about her.

"Yes she did have someone. She had you" he replied, as she felt him squeeze her hand.

"_I_ would have had her in that terrible nursing home, Peter._ I_ was willing to leave her there. You brought her back here and I never thanked you. After all she said and did; the way she spoke to you, you still accepted her".

"It was simple. You needed that time with her. I could never have lived with you so distressed if you had not made it up with her and she had died without you speaking". Peter paused. "Now, no more of this, drink your tea and have some toast".

"Dry" she clarified seeing him get up and turn away. She took a testing sip of tea and replacing the mug on the table, ever so delicately running her nail down the fold of the envelope, thinking.

"Peter?" she asked.

"Hmmm?"

"What would you have done if I had died having Freddie?" It was a question that had been hanging over her shoulders for a long time, but somehow there had never been that moment that felt suitable enough to inquire.

"Camilla, no" he warned, back still to her, twisting the tie on the Sunblest loaf that was to become their breakfast.

"Please tell me", she pleaded, wanting to know in some grotesque way, yet fearful of his response.

She saw his hands rest on the edge of the worktop. "Go to the Inspector, ask to be transferred to Essex and take him to live by the sea with Mum and Dad".

"You thought of that?" She had not been expecting him to truly answer, or provide a response so specific.

"I thought of everything, Camilla!" he responded completely unable to take the sharpness from his voice. He shut his eyes and breathed out, knowing he had snapped at her unnecessarily. "I thought about if neither if you lived, if you lived and he didn't, if he lived and you didn't. I had thoughts for every option".

She could hear the tightness in his voice and he still hadn't turned to look at her. How she wished she had some memory of what happened that day and night, if only to understand the split second of hesitation on his face when she had told him about this little one or how white Sister Evangelina went when she told the Sisters.

"But if we both lived?" she replied. He hadn't dare think of that particular outcome for fear of something turning around and slapping him square in the face as he paced the hospital corridors.

"I know what I did. I went to the Hospital Chapel and said 'thank you'". He coughed, clearing his throat, and turned to her intending on closing the subject. "But least there won't be that worry this time".

"No" Chummy said, nodding her head, referring to the surgery she would have barely a few days before Christmas. She held out a hand for him to sit down again, not quite sure whether she could see tears in his eyes too and kissed him indulging herself in his attention.

"Surprised there's been no little voice" he said suddenly, very gently breaking the kiss.

"He was awake" she replied. "He looked up at me once and fell asleep again. He was in a full Shakespearean dramatic mode". She placed the back of her hand on her own forehead.

_ '__Leave me alone Ma, one's far too busy being tired to be thinking of such trivial things as waking up'._

Peter smiled. "I heard him talking to himself in the middle of the night".

"Was he alright?" she asked, putting the boat tickets safely back in the envelope, leaving the invitation for later consideration.

"Yes completely" he replied, having been to the bathroom, hearing his son giggling and chattering nonsense in the small back bedroom. A minute or two listening at the door had reassured him that he was quite happy to amuse himself. "He sounded perfectly happy with whoever he was talking to so I left him to it".

He saw her turn over the invitation again, still thinking. "One is surprised he just didn't get married and tell us about it later".

"Perhaps he wanted to share it with you all". She looked up at him as though he was mad.

"Alright" he replied, admitting defeat. "Maybe not" he concluded.

"You do realise that this trip could have potentially fatal consequences?" Chummy asked, looking at him out of the corner of her eye.

"What do you mean?" he asked, standing up, feeling it safe that she might not break down again and breathing in the smell of toast.

"Well if all my brothers to decide to land, you may as well have a drip fitted before we go for the amount of alcohol they will try and pour down your neck".

Peter smiled, unfortunately remembering the last time he met her brothers, or at least two of them and the resultant state that he felt and looked the next day.

"I'll be fine", he replied, about to scrape butter over her toast, suddenly realising in distraction that her stomach would never take it.

"It will all be fine. You'll see".


	3. Chapter 3

"Well, that's the rub of it there old chap" Bob announced to Peter as they sat in the back garden of the rented Chelsea property, taking in some late afternoon sun. "Ronnie said the very same thing. Was he having it away with the staff before Ma popped off?"

"Camilla did mention that one of the reasons she left him was his other interests" Peter replied, trying to keep his voice muted to ensure his wife did not hear as she sat with her sister in law on a bench at the other end of the garden. The children had been running rings around them all since that relaxed luncheon a few hours ago and the adults had decided that a rest was in order.

Bob took another drag of his cigarette. "Doesn't necessarily mean he was playing away you know. He spent most of his time permanently attached to the golf course when we last visited and that wasn't too long ago", Bob recalled, thinking back just to that Summer when they had taken the girls for a short holiday. It must just have been before the separation, or rather their Mother's desertion, and Bob would freely admit that the atmosphere was no more stilted than usual.

"You can be so attached to other things that you can lose sight of what is dear to you" Bob continued. "Doesn't necessarily have to be another person".

"Camilla's worried and wondered if you knew anything" Peter enquired, recalling many a conversation since that invitation arrived, mostly in the middle of the night when he could feel her churning matters over in her mind.

"I know" his brother in law replied. "She asked me when she telephoned the other day". Bob raised his hands, palms up in surrender, cigarette smoke drifting away behind him. "I know nothing about it. It was as much as a surprise to you pair as it was to us".

Peter nodded, digesting that Bob seemed to be as much at a loss as they were. "I do suppose we will find out in a while. Are you leaving at the same time as us?" Peter asked.

"Not sure" Bob replied, quickly. "Need to pop down and book the passage this week. Tell me which boat you are on though and one will see what one can do".

Peter hesitated for a moment, frowning. "He didn't send you tickets too?"

Before Bob could reply in the negative, there was a rush to his side and Rosie landed squarely on Peter's knee.

"Rosemary, be careful" her father cautioned; a warning that his middle child entirely ignored and threw her arms around Peter's neck.

"Are you coming to Madeira with us?" she asked, delightedly considering the boat trip. "You and Aunty Chummy?"

"We are" Peter replied, smiling back her, half squinting in the sunlight at his dark haired niece as the sun could be said to have adorned her with a bright halo.

"And is Freddie coming too?" she asked enthusiastically.

"He is".

"Can we look after him for you when we're all there?"

"I think that can be arranged" Peter replied, before Rosie slithered off his knee back to her siblings who were trying to teach Freddie 'Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man' or at least a variation of it that was not too confusing. Peter heard his nieces' findings being reported to her siblings and took another sip of tea.

"I do tell her to be more careful and that she cannot simply start running around and jumping all over people", Bob said, seeing Peter straightening his jacket.

"It's fine" he replied, dismissing the concern. "I woke up this morning with Fred trying to stand on my chest. It's nothing new…"

"So they are all coming?" Chummy asked as she and Ronnie basked in the sun, watching the cousins play on the lawn, seeing Rosie shoot away from Peter.

"So Bob says" Ronnie replied before pausing, sipping tea too. "Well, all except Harry and his two. He won't make it from Australia, but no, Will is already there and George, Ted and Jeremy are apparently making special exception, so it would seem that Pa-in-law will have a full house".

"And all the children as well?" Chummy asked, still slight perturbed that her father had readily invited the whirlwind of an almost two year old that had taken over her house together with _all_ of his cousins.

"Every single one of them", Ronnie replied before pausing. "It does make you suspicious doesn't it?"

"All those children and Pa in one place", Chummy mused, staring skywards shaking her head.

"And another half!" Ronnie replied gesturing towards Chummy, who had subconsciously crossed wrapped her arms around what little bump she sported.

"Yes of course!" Chummy smiled.

"Are you feeling any better?" Ronnie inquired.

"So so" Chummy replied. "One has felt better since Sister Julienne cut my hours down. Lord knows how one will be on the boat though".

Chummy remembered the last time she had sailed. Freetown to Cadiz after one of the most fulfilling periods of her life, but barely able to move without a twinge or a kick. Pregnant but crammed into the smallest cabin alive, baby, husband and wife fighting for space in the tiniest bed imaginable. How big and uncomfortable and obvious she felt, perhaps for the first time in a long while, knowing and feeling the anticipation of home.

Ronnie smiled. "One does suppose you will have to stop working when you have two to contend with".

"Yes" Chummy replied matter of factly; the thought an unspoken one between her and her husband for some weeks. "One thinks Peter won't mind one bit but one has to be sensible about it one supposes and he.. we…did want more than one child so that day had to come when perhaps one would…..step back".

"Wean oneself off, wouldn't you say?" Ronnie suggested, to which her sister in law laughed, seeing Bob and Peter walk away back into the house and almost simultaneously Freddie plonk himself on his eldest's cousin's knee. "Peter just tells me I have too much energy and I need to slow down. I think we were lucky though. Freddie was, is, such a good little chap, always slept".

"Lissy was like that" Ronnie replied, referring to her youngest daughter. "I never thought I would see the day where one of my children slept for a stretch without waking up. Genevieve and Rosie were up and down like yo yos with the Nanny when they were babies. One felt so very bad for her to be up and down all day and night". She paused. "You never had anyone helping did you?"

"No, not really. Mrs Torpy helps once in a while but no. Imagine having a Nanny in Poplar!"

In reality Ronnie could not visualise it at all. It had been par for the course that her children would have a Nanny and whilst she adored her offspring, it would be abnormal to not have a help with the children. Indeed, although she had spent some time in the district she had only really had a taste of Nonnatus, rather than the real Poplar that Chummy saw day and night.

"One is starting to tire of night shifts though" Chummy continued genuinely. "I love what I do, but I love them more. Perhaps when this one is born, I won't know what's hit me and I will need more hours in the day!"

Ronnie laughed. "You might just!"

They had been so absorbed in conversation that neither saw the figure arrive in front of them.

"Mummy. Me tired" a plaintive little voice piped up.

"Oh dear!" Chummy said, putting her arms out to the boy. "Come and have a nap". With sleepy glee Freddie climbed up and settled quickly across her knee, hanging onto her thumb. "And it's _'I'm'_ tired young man" she scolded playfully, getting herself comfortable on the wooden bench.

"Does he know he's going to be a big brother yet?" Ronnie asked, straightening the boys once white socks that were now looking decidedly grubby since he had decided to remove his shoes.

"We did tell him. It went straight over his head though", Chummy replied, smoothing her fingers gently over his forehead as his eyes rapidly closed. "He might notice when he can't sit on my knee any more in a few weeks or there's another person squealing for attention".

"How were the girls when they were added to?" Chummy asked curiously. She had not really thought about how Fred would react to a brother or sister quite yet, still instilling in him the concept of sharing.

"I think Rosie passed Genevieve by. You know Ginny was barely a year old when she became a big sister. Lissy put them both out something extraordinary though! Never have I seen more disgruntled faces when they realised that she was staying put!"

Chummy smiled, noticing Veronica's three daughters playing quietly now on the lawn, their mother grateful that the spats that they had as youngsters seemed now, hopefully to have dissipated.

"Ronnie!" came Bob's voice from across the lawn. "Mr Hollis is here!"

"Mr Hollis?" Chummy inquired.

"The girls music teacher. Ginny has her Grade 2 just before we go to Madeira and we are trying desperately to teach Rosie and Lissy too but they are more interests in dolls than pianos!"

Ronnie stood up. "Come along, you three! Say goodbye to your aunt and uncle and then go and wash your hands!"

Chummy and Fred were engulfed in three girls before they trudged off back up the grass, saying goodbye to Peter on the way to their lesson.

"One must go and make sure that they actually do as they are told!" Ronnie said before she too trotted off passing Peter who came to sit beside his wife, carrying his son's shoes from where they had been discarded on the lawn.

"Bob said the bus goes from the end of the road. He thinks" Peter added quickly, knowing from his brother in law's own confession that he had not been a bus since he was at school.

"I was rather thinking we could take Freddie on the underground" Chummy offered, feeling her son stir at hearing his name. "He's never been".

"What do you say then Freds?" Peter asked, swiftly doing up his son's shoes, causing him to wake a little more. "Bus or train to go home?"

He could see the thought was whirring in his son's mind.

"Chain"...


	4. Chapter 4

"Are you sure you two are comfortable?" Peter asked, watching his wife and son as he pushed their suitcase on top of the wardrobe.

"Of course we are" she replied, smiling at the boy who was asleep, draped over her on the double bed of their cabin for the sail to Madeira. They had been on board barely half and hour and as the boat slowly slipped out of port, Fred had immediately fallen asleep, utterly comfortable using his mother as a pillow.

"I seem to remember this before", Peter responded properly turning to them, recalling the rather uncomfortable return from Sierra Leone where Mother, Father and Son crammed themselves together in bed through simple lack of choice. At least this time her father paying for the passage had afforded a touch more leg room.

"Except when his elbows get too sharp this time I can actually put him in a cot!" Chummy joked, also remembering the then unborn boy who would punch and kick away if his Daddy got too close to his Mummy in that squeeze of a cabin.

"Speaking of which, shouldn't be be in his cot?" Peter asked, taking a pace or towards them, knowing if Freddie was there a minute longer, he would be there for the night and their supper was pending.

"Actually yes", Chummy replied. "He's getting rather heavy on the old belly too". Gently Peter lifted his son from his wife's chest and the boy barely murmured as he was laid into the cot a few feet away.

"Camilla?" he asked, tucking a blanket around Freddie.

"Hmmm?" she replied, sitting up, doing up her cardigan from where it had become rumpled.

"You know that your Dad paid for this passage?" he asked, turning to her leaning against the cot sides.

"Yes", she replied, knowing where this was going. "And he didn't pay for my brothers?" She looked up at him, eyes wide.

"Yes", Peter responded, unable to shake the feeling of awkwardness surrounding the obvious fact that had they had to pay for this trip themselves, well, they would simply not be going.

"Ronnie and I were talking about it" she continued, shuffling over so she was seated on the edge of the bed. She stretched out a hand to him which he gladly took and sat down himself. "One could say, perhaps, that he so desperately wished for us to be there that he paid to make sure we came or he knew we wouldn't be able to afford it thinking he was helping us or perhaps he wanted to make me feel guilty that he still had to pay my way for me? You are welcome to guess which one and I really haven't the faintest!"

Peter sighed. "I do so wish you had a family that…."

"Were a family?" she questioned, seeing him nod.

"There is so much I missed. I know that, Peter" she continued. "That's why I get so scatty. I want to pack in as much as I can now Freddie's here. Well, now they are both here. To make it up. I owe them that I don't allow them to turn out like me" she said, frankly but truthfully.

"We, you and me, are a family Camilla, even if we didn't have the children. I just hope you remember that always". She felt a feather like kiss on her cheek.

Chummy smiled about to say something when there was a polite knock on the door. Quickly for want of feeling unladylike lounging about she stood up. Peter too got up and went to the cabin door, seeing his wife out of the corner of her eye to go to move her handbag from the table.

To her side she heard wheeling of a trolley.

"I thought you might not want to sit in the dining room", Peter said after closing the door again.

Chummy smiled. "I don't and we will probably get frowned upon for Freddie being in there anyway as though every child should be kept locked away". She said it with such force of jollity that she hoped he had not picked up on the comment and how true it had been at one point in her life.

"Well there's enough there to feed the five thousand!" Peter remarked, inspecting the trays.

"Mumma" a voice piped up.

"Oh what-ho!" Chummy remarked, turning around again, knowing the smell of food had got to her son. "Is that little tum of yours rumbling?"

"Have biscuits?" Freddie inquired, pulling himself up off the cot mattress, arms outstretched.

"Do you know I do think there might be a biscuit or two there young man" Chummy replied. "But if you want to have some dinner with us, you have vegetables and fruit and what could well be chicken to eat first".

Chummy, in her heart, knew he might only have understood the minutest part of what she was saying, but she did not believe in baby talk and as much as she would tell him every moment of the day how handsome he was, he was not using those brown eyes to get around eating his vegetables.

"Vegt...tubbles" Fred repeated stuttering slightly trying to get his tongue around the word. "'ave veg...tubbles"

"Yes you are having your vegetables!" she replied, noting that he was dropping his haitches more and more recently.

"No" Fred added, vigorously shaking his head, before Chummy saw her husband smile indulgently at them both, removing the saucer stacked with biscuits to a dresser behind them. Temporarily out of sight out of mind.

The three sat around the small fold out table, Chummy with the boy on her knee, periodically feeding him from a side plate that she had collected together of a good mix of tastes and textures.

"Peter?" she asked. "Do you think that Pa was having an affair? After everything that was said?"

Peter stopped for a moment, turning his tea cup on its saucer. He too had spent many an hour entertaining her mother with cards, and the newspaper and just talking and, in the haze of morphine, she had told him things that perhaps under normal circumstances would never have crossed her lips. Things that he knew his wife was not party to.

"She said…." he started, wondering to tell her but quickly realising that he had to be truthful with her of all people in the world. "She said that she thought he was having an affair with a Mrs Lishman. Grace I think she said her name was".

"Oh! That's one of their old neighbours in India" Chummy replied immediately dismissing it, holding a fork just too far away for her son to reach. Freddie stretched out his arms with a quick scold of his mother for not paying attention. "When I left India the last time she gave me a 'good luck' charm. That gold cloverleaf?"

Peter nodded having seen it tucked into her jewellery box.

"I think that probably _was _the morphine talking. As far as I know she was dead and buried years ago and she didn't have any sons so there could not be a daughter in law".

Peter nodded.

"There's something else" Chummy continued suddenly. "I know that look".

"What one?" he replied trying to sound innocent.

"That one" she responded. "The one where you look at me so quickly and think I don't see. Your bottom lip twitches".

"Do I do that?" he replied, surprised.

"You do. Tell me!" she asked earnestly, wondering what had just shot through his mind.

He frowned. "Peter…tell me". She heard a short puff of air.

"She said that she thought that the housekeeper's youngest daughter was his too", he enunciated quietly, wondering whether, as soon as it left his mouth, if he should have just kept his trap shut.

"Oh!" Chummy replied, feeling her skin turn white.

"She was coming out with all kinds Camilla" he added quickly. "Somethings were obviously the painkillers". He could see her digesting what he had announced, unsure as to how she may react. "She thought Fred was called David and then Daniel at one point!" he added desperately trying to make her feel better.

"Camilla?"

"I only met her once. The daughter" she said. "Josephine. From an angle I thought she looked like Pa, but I dismissed it. It was only a split second. Whatever Pa did he always did it with discretion, I will give him that. Business, home, he never tried to draw attention to himself. Mater did that for him".

"What if she is his daughter?" Peter asked.

Chummy laughed sharply. "He probably pays her so little attention that it might make no difference!"

"No…will that mean anything to you? Personally?"

"Not particularly" Chummy replied. "One supposes that one should feel put out or perhaps betrayed that he found so little in this family – my family – that he had to stray and find solace elsewhere, but no, we were so splintered that one simply has no capacity to feel hurt by it. There was nothing to protect, to feel threatened by if he suddenly had another branch on the tree".

"What would you do if you found out something like that about your Pa?" she asked, curious.

"I'd be furious" Peter replied, bluntly. "I'd never be able to look him in the eye again".

"You see I wish I could feel that towards them" she said, helping her son take a sip of water. "Anger, fear, hurt. I wasn't allowed to show it and now, well…..I can't because if I do, if I become angry and upset you, you'll leave". She hesitated before her mouth ran away with her.

"Camilla? Where on earth did that come from?"

She knew precisely where it originated. That feeling of worthlessness, of why should anybody be concerned about me? I hold no place where anyone should, frankly, waste their time loving me or wanting me safe. No-one can. You were the only one that did and if I lose that, where am I left?

"You are very sadly mistaken if you think that you throwing a fit once in a while is going to put me off. You're going to have to kill me to get rid of me you know…" he warned in a good natured tone.

"Poison you with my dinners?" she suggested.

"Or throw me into the Thames" he offered, shrugging his shoulders, hearing Fred protest again that is mother was being interminably slow between forkfuls.

"Never" Chummy whispered, not able to look him in the eye, instead placing the empty fork down and picking a crumb from her son's pyjamas.

"No,_ never_, exactly Camilla" he said, seeing she could not hold his gaze. "Look at me".

Her head shot up the direct request.

"I love you. He loves you. Whoever that one turns out to be will do as well because you make it that way" he reassured, leaning across the table to rub her hand. "Have I ever ask much of you? Really asked anything of you just to be my wife and his Mum?"

"No" she replied, knowing that in truth he had no expectations of how she should be. It was really quite plain, simple and easy.

No judgments and she was eternally grateful.


	5. Chapter 5

"Where's the women old chap?"

Chummy's brother William - Will – six foot tall, broad shouldered and with a mind as sharp as a tack, passed his sibling a crystal cut glass, overfilled with their father's best Scotch that he had swept from the dining room.

"Bedtime stories with the offspring", George replied, seeing his brother arrive at his side taking up a seat. "Thomas wasn't too keen on the boat trip across from Lisbon. Went quite green around the gills poor little soul and Lexia put him straight to bed. They've all gone up. Including yours!"

"Yes well," Will replied. "No doubt Emmie will come and fetch me when I'm required!"

Will laughed quickly; at least living within a few hundred yards of his parents' home, he did not have to risk boat trips, water or nauseous children who were now thankfully quiet and seemingly exhausted from their trip. Hopefully he might not have to endure much more of the gossip that was flitting between his sister in law and his wife tonight too with the subject being a certain Mrs Hamilton.

The two sons sat on the veranda on the first floor of the vast property, overlooking the sea. The evening dusk was drawing in, but the water, long in the distance down the hill was sparkling and for the first time that day George Browne relaxed.

"It is tonight Chummy's over isn't it?" George asked, knowing his other brothers were due tomorrow instead. "Bringing that husband of hers?"

"Believe so. Swore I heard Pops saying they were arriving about eight-ish". Will looked at his watch. "Imagine they'll be here soon".

"So how do we approach this then brother?" George asked, the subject of their sister not being one that they had discussed before in any great depth but one which, at least on the face of it, could cause ructions.

"With open minds" Will warned. "She made a choice and well, we're all consenting adults here".

George nodded. "Makes you wonder though doesn't it? What possessed her to consider it, surely she knew the parents would lose their rag?"

"It does" Will replied. "Makes you think too what the chaps like if Ma was anything to go by too. Emmie and I thought that there had been a volcanic eruption in London with the amount of lava that was spat out when she came back here after the wedding". Will took a sip from his glass. "Bob seems to rate him though".

"Yes well big brother Bob was always the Oracle on all matters of all kinds!" George replied sarcastically knowing that their father always looked to his eldest son for view and an opinion above all the others. It had rankled him years ago, being the second oldest, but now there were more pressing concerns than assisting Pops in choosing another new car or relieving the last driver of his duties.

"One will give her some credit for standing up to Ma though!" Will remarked.

"That did take some guts, yes" George nodded. "Still our sister has never done things the 'accepted' way!"

"Mind you, you know what Ma was like. Anything that she did approve of…." George carried on, drifting off, waving his hand in a dismissive manner knowing his brother knew exactly what he meant. "He could treat her like royalty for as much that we know and Ma would have said the opposite".

"Can't help but be curious though, wondering what she was thinking but you know me" Will said with a shrug. "One's a nosy old git. Genetically inherited it off Grand-mama".

The brothers smiled and for a moment there was a companionable silence, only hearing the purr of an engine that passed by the house several feet below them.

"Fancy a drive?" Will asked suddenly, getting that itchy feeling of curiosity.

"Cancel the old chauffeur and take a spin down to the port do you mean?" George replied, raising an eyebrow, seeing the path his brother was taking.

"Game if you are!"

The brothers quickly downed their drinks and made their way downstairs.

"So remind me who belongs to who?" Peter had asked as they lay in bed as the boat made its way through the night, knowing that in a few hours they would be in Madeira. He saw his wife take a deep breath.

"Well" she started. "You know Bob and Ronnie and their girls".

"Yes I can manage to remember that!" he replied sarcastically to which he received a genial tap on the back of his hand for answering her back.

"Well, George is married to Alexia" she started, ready to rattle off her rather numerous set of nieces and nephews. "Lexia is part Russian, part French. You won't notice she has an accent at all. They have Gregory, Samuel, Thomas and baby Caroline. Except she mustn't be much of a baby now. I think she's a good six or seventh months older than Fred, if not more. Will is married to Emma. They have William, Sophia, Amelia and George. Amelia and George are a set of twins. Will is on the one that lives on the Island – the accountant - and Jeremy is married to Ruth. They live in Spain and have Roberta and little Theo. He's the only one younger than Monkey-Chops".

Peters smiled at the use of Sister Evangelina's nickname for their son, even though she used it sparingly and mostly when she thought everyone was out of hearing distance.

"So with Bob's girls and Fred that's…." Peter hesitated, counting the names.

"14" she replied, stretching her back trying to make herself comfortable.

"Right" Peter had replied before suggesting to her that perhaps they should sleep as undoubtedly the next few days were going to be busy. He did not really want to think whether busy would be of the practical or emotional kind.

"On one condition" she responded, Peter unable to see her face in the dark.

"Go on?" he replied, thinking it had to be a request to get something for her as she was using that particular tone of voice.

"Get up and pass me that spare pillow from the wardrobe? My hip is unspeakably annoying" she asked, shifting about being entirely unable to avoid that nagging, irritating, restless feeling buried in her pelvis.

He got up and walked to the other side of the cabin, checking the baby was still asleep on his way.

"Why does this work?" he asked, having seen her do this many a time in the last few weeks before Fred was born and not thinking to ask.

"It makes sure my hips are all aligned. It decreases strain" she explained.

"Oh right" he replied seeing her receiving the pillow and spiriting it away under the bed covers. "You didn't do that until a few weeks before Fred was born, not this early". Everything, every little ache and pain, every extra hour than normal that she slept, disconcerted him into almost unnatural worry that he did try to hide and not make comment upon.

"Like I said", she replied, breathing heavily at the almost instant relief. "Every pregnancy is different".

"So you said" he said crawling into bed behind her, snuggling up to her back.

Now standing as the boat slowly slipped into port, Peter was sure he had forgotten a name or two of his nieces and nephews, tired from deliberately waiting for her to fall asleep last night and with some apprehension.

"Oh hello" Chummy announced suddenly as they walked along the deck to the ramp, Fred breathing quietly in sleep on her neck. Peter was a pace or two behind carrying their suitcases.

"It would seem we have the Portuguese Inquisition!" she whispered back to him.

"Sorry?"

"No driver it would seem like Pa said" she clarified. "Will and George are down there".

Chummy did not gesture to where they were standing as she could see her brothers had spotted them and were waving. She suddenly tensed; the evening air feeling colder than it actually was as each step took them closer to them.

"Peter, this is Will and George. Will and George this is Peter" she said, after receiving a kiss each from her brothers.

The three men shook hands and she could tell her brothers were sizing her husband up.

"And one does believe that this must be young Fred?" George asked. Chummy smiled at the mention of her son's name, turning him slightly so her brothers could see his face.

A thought suddenly shot through Will's mind as he saw the sleeping boy. A conversation with his father on receipt of a letter from his sister, tucked into it a photograph of a bright eyed six month old grandson.

_"__Well he is certainly not a Browne!"  
_

It has struck Will as odd why his father had said such a thing but for the sake of his sister he wouldn't be raising it. It could have been entirely innocent, an indication that simply Fred must resemble a Noakes rather than have Browne genes or was it something more insipid? A rejection perhaps?

"Pass those suitcases over old chap and you and Chummy get in the car" George announced, gesturing towards the dark navy Mercedes Benz 300 that was parked a few feet away.

"Peter, can you take him?" Chummy asked, knowing that carrying Fred and leaning down in her current state to get into the car was not going to happen.

The parties were all settled in the car and it drew away, Fred now installed back on her lap and this time it was Chummy's turn to give her husband a reassuring squeeze of the hand.

"This is my new toy" Will announced from the wheel. "What do you think?"

"Rather magnificent creature" Peter replied, having admired the sleek wing on their walk 'down the plank' from the boat.

"You lot have Wolseley's don't you?" Will continued, the 'you lot' clearly being the Metropolitan Police Force.

Chummy let them get on with it, pleased that they seemed to have struck up a conversation relatively easily, even though it was about cars. They were never her thing. She had enjoyed her driving lessons with Peter in Sierra Leone, if only because they would drive for miles and sit on the engine if it was chilly or on the running board, tucked behind the door if it was warm, and just gaze out at their peaceful surroundings. She had not sat behind a wheel for a long time now and even then, other those other times, it was only a means from getting from one place to another in one piece when she drove the rickety, rust filled Mission van.

As the three men conversed, Chummy watched the port slowly move away from them as they drove up the hill towards her father's house, passing grand houses with long drives and immaculate gardens.

A multitude of stars twinkled at her and gently resting her hand on her boy's chest she prayed silently for the strength that she may need in the next few days.


	6. Chapter 6

The breakfast room was empty. Apart from Fred, his cousin Theo who Peter guessed must only be a few weeks younger than his son, and their older cousin, Bob's girl Genevieve seemingly the closest thing to an appropriate adult that was within yards. He had woken to an empty bed, an equally vacant cot and the early morning sun streaking in through the open muslin curtains.

"Aunty Chummy and Mummy are in the garden. Aunty Ruth's there too" Genevieve offered as she pulled away Theo's hand that was perilously close to a knife on the table. Clearly Chummy's brother Jeremy had arrived at some point in that early morning if the appearance of his only son was apparent.

"I'll take them both outside" Peter offered, seeing a slightly harassed look in fourteen year old Genevieve's eyes and she smiled rosily at him for the blessed release of two toddlers.

Picking Theo up and receiving a 'no' from Fred for the offer of a lift outside, the eldest boy still followed his father and trotted away behind him into the garden. Peter could see Chummy and her sisters in law sitting in the early morning sun away down by the edge of her father's small orchard. 'Garden?' he thought, remembering Genevieve's words. 'More likely a stately home'.

As he walked cross the path his presence was noted and he received three smiles.

"Is breakfast ready?" Chummy asked.

Peter smiled. "I see you're feeling better then" he remarked, gently placing his temporary charge down on the floor to allow him to toddle off to his mother. He could see Fred ticking over in his mind as to whether he could make a run for it into the orchard whilst his father's back was turned so he was placed between his parents on the wooden garden seat as Peter sat down.

"No not yet" he continued, settling down. "I don't think everyone's up yet".

"We were just talking about Pa-in-law last night" Ronnie remarked. "How…_friendly_ he was".

"We were quite taken aback" Chummy chipped in. Her father's unnerving effusive welcome had troubled her and when they had departed for bed, he had actually taken young Fred's hand and walked with him to the door of one of the many guest rooms where Chummy and Peter would reside for the next few days. He had hesitated at giving his daughter a kiss on the cheek but if he had, Chummy later freely admitted to her husband, she might not have known how to react if he did.

"And he was up and away out somewhere before we even had the children dressed" Ronnie continued.

"He was up this early?" Chummy asked with surprise, recalling from childhood that unless her father had a pressing appointment, he would reside upstairs until at least ten o'clock primarily to avoid, it would seem, breakfasting with any of the children who might by chance be home from Winchester or Roedean.

"Oh yes", Ruth replied. "I rather think that the children, Jeremy and I arriving at the crack of dawn perhaps disturbed him somewhat!"

All the parties smiled, Chummy remembering that she had not introduced her husband to her other sister in law.

"One forgets oneself!" Chummy suddenly announced seeing Fred slither down from his seat between his parents onto the grass. "Ruthie this is Peter, Peter my sister in law Ruth".

"One had gathered that!" Ruth responded laughing as she shook Peter's hand over Chummy's knee. "Thank you for bringing Theo out as well. He is entirely too fast on his feet these days and one simply cannot keep up with him!"

"It's quite alright" Peter replied, seeing for the first time the walking stick laid down on the ground beside her. He thought it perhaps polite not to ask in company but would reserve that question for his wife later.

From the balcony upstairs another figure appeared.

"Oh look!" Ronnie exclaimed, waving upwards. "Ted!"

"What ho, Ronnie old girl!" he yelled from high above them, waving back. "Morning everyone! Just off to see if breakfast is on the table yet! Will give you a quick bellow if it is!"

He waved again and walked back into house.

"He must have arrived late last night" Ronnie continued lowering her voice even though there was minimal chance he would hear. "Surprised he came to be truthful. You know what he's like" she concluded as there was a murmur of agreement.

"I think Pa in law did well to get who he did" Ruth offered. "Such short notice for the whole shebang!"

To their side, Bob came bounding up across the grass.

"Morning all! Chummy old girl, we've been summoned to Pop's study", Bob announced dramatically.

Peter, Ruth, Ronnie and Chummy all got to get up, Fred and Theo now sitting by their feet pulling chunks of grass from the lawn.

"No, no, no, no" Bob sang. "Just the kiddiewinks. He wants the five of us alone!" Chummy saw her brother's eyes widen in mock horror at what might be to come and it didn't help.

The five children sat side by side on two settees in their fathers study. Father however was nowhere to be seen.

"Are you sure old chap that this isn't a ruse to separate us and torture us quietly away from our loved ones?" Ted offered to his brother, almost whispering.

"One doesn't like to hazard a guess Ted my friend" Jeremy, who was seated next to him, replied quietly too wondering what this was all about. Every child's relationship with their father was fractured in its own way from so little engagement. He was not a stranger to the boys, they would freely admit that, but the struggle to converse over anything else but cricket and cars was at sometimes painful to witness.

On the other settee, Bob, Chummy and George were sitting.

"Are you alright there?" Bob asked as he gently laid his hand on his sisters. He could see she was tormenting the buttons that ran down the front of her dress.

"Yes, sorry!" she replied whispering. "Yes, I'm tip top as always". Baby was having a good old party, probably in reaction to the adrenaline that was flowing through her blood and it was making her feel quite unwell.

To their side the door clicked shut and five heads shot around.

"Ah!" their father remarked. "All of you are here". He took up a single seat by the unlit fire, one leg crossed over the other and hands tight in his lap.

None of the siblings dare speak; wondering why they were summoned; not entirely sure what to even to say to their father with this new turn of events.

"One seems to think you will have your own views on why you have been brought here" he stated as collectively they nodded as that what was the truth.

_"__Yes Pops"_

_"__Yes Pa"_

"Well one wishes to make it clear, before Saturday, that I wished to have you here as my children and my welcome guests" he continued. "You all know Mrs Hamilton and you know that matters between your Mother and me where not as they might have been when you were younger. You also know that we were estranged when your mother sadly passed away". He cleared his throat.

"Now, I simply wish to say that I would hope that you will welcome Mrs Hamilton". He hesitated. "That you will welcome _Margaret_".

_"__Yes Pops"_

_"__Yes Pa"_

"Had you not been grown adults one would perhaps have to ask for your acceptance of this situation or felt that one had to explain oneself further before I made such a decision to bring Margaret into this household. However, you _are _grown adults and as a consequence, despite the fact that you are my children, my family, one does not appreciate or expect to hear speculation".

_"__No Pops"_

_"__No Pa"_

"One intends two nights before the wedding, so on Thursday, to have a small gathering for the guests" he continued. "Old friends and so forth. One has arranged for assistance in taking care of the children that night as one does not believe that they quite belong in such an environment".

_"__No Pops"_

_"__No Pa"_

"You will remember the Callaghan sisters from when you were younger. They have agreed to kindly take care of the children for you all, feed them, read stories, all of those things".

_"__Yes Pops"_

_"__Yes Pa"_

"Now I do think for breakfast today I will perhaps ask the staff if we might have it on the lawn. Let the children run around a little, what?"

_"__Yes Pops"_

_"__Yes Pa"_

Their father stood up, shook out his jacket and looked at his children. "Well are you all sitting there like statues or are you coming outside?"

"Breakfast on the lawn?" Ruth whispered to Peter .

"Seems so" he replied, his wife's sister in law on his arm as he helped her walk from the orchard to the small group of chairs and tables that the brothers had brought out. Two benches had already been dragged across and the children occupied picnic blankets on the grass. Peter settled her down.

"You are probably wondering why a 36 year old woman is wandering around like a cripple?" she said suddenly.

"No, not really" Peter replied, trying to polite and sincere, even though he had wondered.

"Fell downstairs two weeks before Theo was born. Broke my kneecap and my ankle was dislocated and fractured. Damn lucky he lived apparently and well, never been the same since!" He heard that same jollity he could hear in his wife's voice all the time when she was unwell or had news to impart.

"I am sorry to hear that" Peter replied as he saw Ruth smile acknowledging him.

"Can I get you some tea?" he asked.

"One is capable!" she replied with a laugh in her voice.

"I know but can I get you some tea?" he repeated.

She smiled up at him, actually thankful for the offer. "Yes of course. I'd be most grateful".

A few minutes later, from the back of the house, his wife arrived, three children – Lissy, George and Freddie – with her as she settled all three on the ground, before walking to her husband who was now seated back next to Ruth. Her father had also wandered through with a string of grandchildren and daughters in law behind him.

Chummy herself sat next to her husband, landing straight down onto Peter's hand; him too slow to whip it out of the way. Sneakily, he tried to slide his hand away, without anyone noticing.

Trouble was his wife did.


	7. Chapter 7

"Peter shush!" Chummy offered as they sped up the stairs, intent on a quick change of clothes for a walk up into the hills, having enjoyed what transpired to be a relatively relaxed breakfast.

"What for?" he replied, whispering, chasing after her. "I didn't do anything!"

"You did!" she replied, closing the bedroom door behind them. "You practically groped me three feet away from my father!"

"You sat on my hand Camilla" he replied, straight-faced, standing blocking her way. "What was I meant to do?" He could see she was trying not to laugh at the absurdity of it all, remembering seeing him checking if anyone had noticed just where he had retrieved himself exactly from. The look on his face was enough – doe eyes that their son had inherited that would strike Chummy down for the rest of her life.

"You sat on my hand and I needed it back!" he exclaimed. "And you _are_ laughing Camilla. Don't you dare say otherwise!" She was biting her bottom lip failing to tell him off.

He took three steps towards her and suddenly found herself pinned against the back of the door, forehead resting on his shoulder almost breathless with laughter, feeling his lips graze her neck.

"Peter, stop it!" she said, voice cracking, any will she had felt to stop him even five seconds ago having wilted away. "This is my father's house …!"

He withdrew immediately, feeling her anxiety, acknowledging that she was driving at respect that he ought to be having for his father in law. He did however leave his arms around her waist, still restraining her.

"Where's the b….?" She was about to ask where their son was, voice soft and smiling stupidly at him.

"Jeremy has him" Peter replied. "Has them all actually. They're going to pick apples with him and Ruth. Your Dad said he was going to get your stepmother to cook a couple of pies with them."

"Pa is letting them ruin his orchard?!" she asked incredulously. The orchard in the house in India and indeed the one in Somerset, was simply a place where you did not go. She remembered with some pain the punishment her brother George received when he stole an apple one sunny day and she dare not step foot in there herself for fear of the same.

"Apparently so" Peter replied, somewhere buried in her neck, now entirely ignoring her plea.

"Wait a bally minute…my stepmother?!" Chummy suddenly realised what he had said.

"Well that's what she is, isn't she?" Peter inquired, raising his head, frowning at her.

"Yes" his wife replied. "I suppose she is". Peter noticed immediately the look in her eye and the quietness of her voice.

"Come on" he continued, releasing her. "We've a walk to go on. Let's stop thinking for an hour or so".

"Slacks old girl?" was the first thing Chummy heard when she and Peter met Bob, Ronnie, George and Lexia in the hallway.

"Yes Robert!" Ronnie replied for her. "Those things with two legs that you say us women ought not to wear!"

Chummy smiled. "It's called time moving on Bobs. You ought to try it one day perhaps!"

The whole party laughed although Chummy did take note that her two sisters in law were in skirts and blouses. Together the six stepped from the hallway out to the front lawn of the house.

"Will knows his way around this island more than the rest of us" Bob noted as they stood taking in the sun. "Where's he sloped off to?"

"He and Ted have gone into town" Lexia replied.

"Collecting something for the party apparently" George continued, finishing her sentence for her, both having seen his brother's drive off twenty or so minutes ago.

"Right! As we have been left to whatever wild beasts are lying in wait for us, are we attacking this hill or what?" Bob asked, taking his wife's arm.

It was a glorious early morning. The sun was firmly over the yard arm although nobody at this stage was thinking of alcohol. Each couple walked at their own pace down the road and up to a path where Sir Rex had directed them to go for the best views over the harbour. The ground underneath their feet was dusty and dry but they had all the time in the world to enjoy their surroundings, becoming more tranquil as they moved further from the road. Noise from road was gone and with a gentle cooling breeze that made the branches of the trees dance around them they walked lost in separate conversation.

"Camilla? Are you alright?" Peter whispered seeing her visibly start lagging behind.

She smiled at him, looking pink in the face. "Yes" she breathed. "One's only walked a few hundred yards and one's knackered already!"

Peter smiled at the use of the word 'knackered'. That would not have passed her lips a few years ago.

"Shall we have a sit down then?" he asked, gesturing to a handful of boulders to their side.

She nodded gratefully, Peter shouting ahead to the others who were a good thirty or forty yards ahead. As she sat down, she heard George shout back 'see you at the top!'

"If you want to go back down, say so", Peter said as they settled side by side.

"I think a sit down will be fine as long as we can find another boulder soon!" she replied, breathing out, looking down at the harbour drinking in the sun.

Peter took her hand. She was far too warm.

"You know the slightest bit of exercise wears me out now" she continued, qualifying herself.

"I do" he sighed, kissing her cheek.

"One's not sure if one is going to be pleased for this pregnancy to be over" she remarked.

"Well perhaps by the time this one is born that pill might have made its way here from America" he said casually, wrapping her hand in both of his laying it on his lap.

"How did you know about that?" she asked, head swinging round.

"I spend half of my life at Nonnatus!" he said. "I hear things. Things I don't want to hear sometimes too!" he joked, leaning into her as though he was telling her a secret.

"Sister Julienne and Sister Evangelina were talking about it a few weeks ago that it had been approved" Chummy noted, having sat through what could be termed one of Sister Evangelina's 'lectures'.

"I don't want you ill again Camilla and if it takes that, then so be it" he concluded.

"What about you wanting six children?!" she asked, recalling a conversation not so long ago where she had not been sure that he had been jostling with her.

"And I said I would settle for one as long as I had you" he replied simply. "I stand by that".

Chummy hesitated for a second, but needing to say it. "If something does happen to me, ever happens to me, you must get married again".

"No" he replied without hesitation, the thought abhorrent.

"Peter. Freddie and this one; they need a mother. You need a wife".

"I have one and they have a mother". It was quite plain and simple. The prospect of marrying again? No.

She frowned and he could see she was struggling to express herself. "Peter I'm serious. I know the surgery is booked and I know that delivering ten days early was intended to try and prevent it happening again". Her voice was wobbling. She also knew she was being dramatic, but there were so many days where this pregnancy was simply so much of an effort. Freddie had been plain sailing compared to this and she felt so weak and listless and it played on her emotions far too much. The joy of their second child had been tempered with fear, debilitating tiredness and anxiety about what was to come and it exhausted her.

"But if it does, I want you to make sure the baby is alright and they ask you to make a choice, choose the baby". Once it was out of her mouth it sounded so ridiculous, but it had been said now.

"No Camilla" he replied, getting up, walking away up to the edge of the hill, squinting into the sun, desperate to stop the tears that were building unwanted in his eyes. She didn't, _ought not,_ to see how weak he felt he was in the overwhelming desperation of the memory of every single second of that day and night.

She had begged Dr Turner to let her see her medical notes but he had refused point blank. It was the not knowing that was making matters all together far too terrifying. If she knew how close, or not, that she actually came to it, she could start rationalising her wild imagination.

"I want to know" she pleaded.

"After this one is born", he said. See her safely through this delivery and hope that it might expunge some of the memories so he could find words to describe what was coursing through his mind. He was not meant to feel this way. He was meant to be the strong one; looking after her; keeping her safe and he'd failed once. It had to be made right the second time.

"Peter, please. It's like something is missing, a gap. I have too many missing pieces already from my family and I don't want to start our life together the same way".

"No" he replied, not looking back and starting to walk again, further up the hill. Chummy closed her eyes and breathed heavily, summoning up the will to continue walking.

"Are they having a bit of a spat?" Lexia whispered to Ronnie as they walked ahead, looking back seeing only Peter walk towards them.

"I hope not".

Back at the house, Chummy took herself for a nap. It was lunch time in a little while but she did not feel that she could consume the tiniest little scrap. There was a knock on the bedroom door.

"Come in!" Chummy announced, straightening her dress, seeing Ronnie and Lexia slip into the room.

"Where's Peter? Lexia asked, Ronnie standing to her side.

"Taken Fred and the twins down to the port to see the boats" Chummy replied, remembering the solemn, hesitant kiss on her cheek and Fred, hearing that Mummy was being left behind, throwing his arms around her as though he would never see her again. Peter had closed the door so gently behind him, it send the room into such depressive quietude that the tears that had been sitting in the back of her throat since the walk, flowed like a river.

"Sit down!" she said.

"Are you alright?" Ronnie asked, far too conscious of the episode on the hill.

"Yes of course" Chummy replied, smiling.

"We were just worried about when you were taking a rest on the walk" Lexia said, both women sitting on two chairs by the open window.

"Did you see that?" Chummy asked seeing both women nod.

"It wasn't a fight not really. I want him to tell me what happened when Fred was born and he won't tell me".

"Are you surprised?" Ronnie asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Chummy you nearly died" Ronnie enunciated.

"I know that".

"No", Ronnie continued. "One doesn't think you do".

"Apologise to him and don't push him" Lexia said. "You know how difficult it sometimes is to talk – properly – to people we profess to love. You have the luxury of no memory of it. Its easy to talk of things you know nothing about".

Chummy sat reflecting as her sisters in law left. She knew he gave her far more free reign than most husbands gave their wives. She saw it every day. Perhaps in her own way she had taken advantage of his easy going nature simply through not realising just how much of a free reign that she did actually have, even as a mother of two.

Perhaps she should take note from wives around her, her sisters in law and the women she served every day and she would apologise.


	8. Chapter 8

"So when is my grandchild due?" Sir Rex asked, walking up behind Peter as the latter watched the chaos that was unfolding of a mini game of rounders on the lawn and Rosie singing 'Ring a Ring a Roses' at the top of her voice entertaining those that were too little to join in.

"Boxing Day, but she is going to have the surgery on 16th December" Peter replied, turning his head.

"Surgery?" Sir Rex asked, pushing a glass of Whiskey into his son-in-law's hand.

"Yes after last time", Peter replied hoping not to be pressed.

"Yes" Sir Rex replied, taking a sip. "Her mother did say she had a bit of a time of it but I have to say did not elaborate".

"She nearly died" Peter stated bluntly.

"One did not realise it was quite that severe" his father in law replied, an element of shock clear in his voice, knowing of the operation from his wife but not of the events that led up to it.

"It'll mean she will spend Christmas Day in Hospital but that doesn't matter", Peter concluded, hoping he could steer his father in law away, putting Christmas aside for the second year in a row.

"They keep them in that long?" Sir Rex asked, raising his face to the sky, breathing in the afternoon sun.

"Yes" Peter replied, remembering last time and the two weeks she was retained, desperate to leave and threatening to discharge herself.

"And you will have someone in to care for Freddie whilst she's in Hospital?"

"No" Peter responded. "I booked leave when we found out she would have the surgery. We'll manage fine between us. She was so ill after Freddie that we just got into a way of sharing things - baths, dressing - and well, we didn't stop so no, there will be nobody in".

"There are days when I wonder what it might have been like to dress them or comb their hair" Sir Rex noted. "The Ayah took care of it and then one day each of them fell from my hands. School and then University. Years would pass before I would see them. My daughter has been married and twice a mother since I last saw her. Longer even". He paused, forehead breaking into a frown for a moment. "Is she a good mother?"

"Yes" Peter replied, voice clear and definite, not so incredulous that the question had to be asked, knowing how distant a parent his father in law had been. "She certainly is". All he could hear was Fred and Theo cackling as they hung onto Rosie as she spun around the grass. The fact that he was so sociable was that decision to put him into Nursery he was sure of that. It was the only thing that truly sat well about her decision to go back to work that their son wasn't a shy, scared little boy who avoided people. That was the one thing Chummy was most frightened about before he was born; that he would take after her.

"I dare say my marriage to Margaret came as a surprise" her father said seeing Peter nod. "Much the same as her marriage to you was to me" he added, thankfully with a smile attached to it that made Peter relax.

"One imagines my children will be thinking that as Margaret had been our housekeeper for some time that I had been conducting myself in an unfit manner. Am I not right?" Whilst he had already dealt with the subject with his children just that morning, Sir Rex was entirely unsure that his declarations had assuaged any curiosities or gossip that might have passed between them.

"Yes", Peter replied. "I did hear such".

"Well", his father in law replied. "One imagines that Chummy has told you what was discussed this morning".

"She hasn't" Peter responded. "Not yet".

"Well I wish to be direct with you and I would hope that you would also allow me the courtesy?", his father in law asked, feeling the need to converse with someone who was slightly distanced from the whole blessed business.

"Of course".

"Her mother and me began to fall out three years ago. The children had their own lives and one does not suppose that they may notice, but one does think that it was the move to Madeira that did it. She did not wish to come here and made that plain. I was so engaged in the move that I failed to take her view into account".

During the conversations whilst his mother in law lay dying, she had said the very same thing. It was the one consistent statement she made under the haze of morphine.

_"__One wishes that we had not moved to the Island. It pains me that we did as it was the end and Sir Rex simply could not see my distress"._

"One does feel that one could have dealt with that situation in a manner more conducive to the gulf that might not have induced such a bitter end to the marriage" he continued.

Peter was about to say something but then bit his tongue – a sentence his mother in law uttered, one of the last cogent things that passed her lips.

_"__As much as you believe me cold, I am capable of feeling". _

"One believes from my wife that you had knowledge of my daughter before you married her?" Sir Rex asked, too wanting to navigate away from a conversation that could become uncomfortable, suddenly realising he was perhaps saying too much; that his new found future was causing his mouth to run away with itself.

Peter nearly choked at the question, not expecting him to be quite that 'direct'. As far as he knew Lady Browne had kept that particular titbit to herself. "Camilla made a free choice to do as she wished and she wished to under no influence from me". It was the only thing he could think of saying but it did summarise the truth.

"One cannot say that one is pleased that she took the decision to bring shame upon herself, but what's done is done and no matter my thoughts, I cannot retrieve time". He paused. "Sometimes one thinks that one would like to".

"Her mother's fury was something unbound when she returned from the wedding" her father carried on. "She always felt that Chummy could have much more. Material things; such that material things matter" he concluded, taking a generous mouthful of spirit.

"They don't" Peter replied. "We have a roof over our heads, food on the table and each other. Things are going to be tight for a while when this one is born but we'll manage".

"She was making choices that, when one reflects, show strength one did not know she had", Sir Rex advised. "You do know she has a Trust fund?" Sir Rex asked.

Peter nodded "I do"

"It was her grandfather that set it up for her. My father. In her parents' names until she married, if she married and then it would fall into her husband's name to manage. Her mother and I discussed it and…." He paused. "In the spirit of the directness you have shown me, we felt that it would disappear rather swiftly if it fell into the hands of somebody who had never known money of that nature".

Peter concurred, knowing that that was from his wife's own admission that she felt that that was the reason - that he would somehow gamble or drink it away.

"We were thinking of our daughter's benefit but with hindsight, I personally am unsure whether it was the correct decision as I feel now that it was based purely on an unwarranted prejudice" her father continued. "And I have no doubt that what holds her in London was, is, something my wife simply failed to understand and I did not appreciate. I ought to have met you and my daughter before the marriage. One might have conducted oneself differently".

"What's done is done" Peter replied, having not given a second thought to the Trust Fund after she had told him about it on Honeymoon. Chummy would also say that it had not been in the forefront of her mind either.

"My daughter has changed and has exhibited judgment I did not expect of her. That is abundantly clear and one feels one ought to reconsider her position", Sir Rex concluded.

"All I want is her and our children. I don't want her money" Peter declared genuinely.

His father in law nodded, accepting the declaration. He would still think it over though.

The next time that Peter was allowed an opportunity with his wife she was sitting cross legged on a picnic blanket in the shade of a gnarled Oak tree, young Theo asleep curled up on her knee and Freddie looking as though he too was about to drop off, playing with a toy boat beside her.

Peter sat, crossed legged, mirroring her position and smiled hesitantly at her; not quite knowing how the land lay after this morning. She smiled at him, entirely unable to be upset with him for very long.

"I saw you talking to Pa", she noted. "Was he alright?"

"Yes" Peter replied, thinking he would just say it. "He was talking of signing your Trust Fund back to you".

"To you you mean? I know that clause is in there. Grandpa told me. He thought he was protecting me" She paused. "From 'unscrupulous Dandy's' who would take advantage of me! Those were his words" she smiled, remembering her 96 year old grandpa and that conversation on her 18th birthday when he had taken her aside.

Peter smiled. "Well yes, sign it over to me, but its your money. I don't want it".

"This is Pa's way of trying to make amends" she mused.

"I think it is" Peter replied. "I think he is trying to make a start". Fred abandoned the boat he had been playing with and crawled over to his father's knee, taking up much the same position as his cousin, toying with a button Peter's shirt, ready for an afternoon nap.

"But through money. As though money can buy back everything" Chummy sighed.

"I don't think he is Camilla. He admitted it was a mistake to not give you access to the Trust when we got married".

"Hindsight Peter" she warned.

"Maybe so. But talk to him" he pleaded. "I really think he is trying to build bridges and it may be the only way he knows how".

"I'm surprised he even had that depth of conversation with you" she said, quite unsure what drove her father to let anyone climb over that invisible brick wall that she had known all her life.

"He did" Peter replied. "Just please speak to him about it".

She looked up at him. "Very well, I will".


	9. Chapter 9

The sound of a child screaming taunted her out of sleep. Chummy opened her eyes to the darkness of the bedroom thinking that the squealing and crying somehow didn't sound like Freddie at all and her heart was relieved that, at first glance, he was splayed out, legs and arms all skew-whiff in his cot a few feet away. It did not give her that overwhelming need to run to his side and bury him in her arms and for a moment she wondered whether or not she was hearing things.

"It's Theo" she heard from somewhere to her right,

"Peter?" she asked, still hazy in sleep, realising the bed was empty beside her.

"Just me" he replied as she opened her eyes properly seeing him sitting on a wooden recliner on the balcony. "It's too hot to sleep" he offered seeing her suddenly worried face.

"Is that all?" she asked, rooting for her glasses from the bedside table before sweeping away the sheet.

"Yes" he replied, smiling across at her as she tapped across the bedroom floor to the recliner next to him. "Far, far, too hot" he breathed, feeling much better after a few minutes in moving air on the balcony. It was the dense, inert air that felt like a weight on his chest and made sleep unbearable; unable to breathe until the slight breeze crept across the balcony.

"It is rather on the warm side" she replied, having chosen the thinnest, lightest nightdress she could find. "But then again one should be used to it after India".

He smiled as she sat down stretching her legs out in front of her, not bothering with slippers.

"What was it like growing up in India?" he asked curious for more of the bits and pieces of information she had given him over the years. "Apart from hot?" he added quickly.

"If you think of the environment, it was glorious" Chummy replied. "So much space and greenery". Peter had seen the pictures of the house that had been her childhood home for those times she was not at Roedean. Huge columns adorned the property with vast gardens, brimming with blossoming flowers and abundant trees, colour only imagined from the black and white photographs she had brought with her to the marital home. They never saw the light of day until he asked and even then, once viewed, they were safely returned to their shoebox at the back of the wardrobe. Sometimes it helped her that they were out of sight.

"Every day the Ayah would take us out and we would go and visit her father or we would go and see the cook's sister" she offered. "She would give us Doodh Peda and would always make sure we didn't have any crumbs on our clothes before we went home. Give us a good old fashioned brush over before we left and she would make us Coconut Burfi too – its like fudge - but we were allowed to take that home as Mater liked it". She sighed, memories of those days walking along the dusty road until you arrived at the tiny two roomed house with its ramshackle roof. "It was meant to be a sweet you made for celebrations or festivals but she would always say that it was a special occasion when Ted and I came to visit so she made it all the time".

"She would never call me Chummy or Camilla either. It was Rashmi" she concluded.

"What does that mean?" Peter asked of her nickname.

"A ray of light apparently" she replied feeling him take up her hand as he reached across the small gap between chairs.

"Well I never knew her but I firmly agree with her", he replied, leaning to kiss the back of her hand seeing her smile. Why he always had to say things like that; when she could feel her insides forming into one gooey mess in a single sentence.

"Tell me more" he asked, settling down and closing his eyes to listen. He'd had dreams as a kid of all these places he would visit when he grew older. Little did Peter know that his travels would take him, at first, to France and Belgium; enforced to fight to preserve his own life. Sierra Leone would be the place he would take as the first of many distant lands he would hope to visit.

Chummy thought for a second. What else was there to tell? He knew about the house, had seen those pictures, and there was little more to add about her family that he had not already certainly heard the gist of and it was only misery.

"I don't know" she replied, sadly, entirely flummoxed as to what to tell him in what was a life of such restriction and control. There weren't those moments of unbridled wildness she could share. He'd told her when he was eleven he jumped into a quarry, sinking into the water and not being afraid of drowning. She could mention the parties but that would inevitably entail talking of her mother's matchmaking and her ultimate humiliation. How she wished there were stories of swimming in quarries, or running hell for leather across a farmer's field with a herd of cows charging headlong after you. She hadn't stopped smiling for days after he told her that just wondering what it would have been liked to have been _allowed_.

"What about friends?" he asked.

"Only those Mater chose for me; even at school. Those she considered suitable. We were never allowed to consort with local children; it was always other English children. Even the Ayah was strict on us not mixing with her own nieces and nephews".

"Why?"

"Simple. A different class. I suppose it was if we learnt bad manners or learned how to swear in Hindi, even though we did. I don't know".

"Go on then swear at me in Hindi" he said making himself more comfortable, shifting his shoulders has he bedded down.

"No!" she exclaimed, suddenly highly embarrassed.

"Go on!" he replied, squeezing her hand and grinning at her. "I've heard you swear in Creole, what's different about Hindi?"

"No!" she repeated, laughing as she caught his eye . "No I'm not going to swear in Hindi and not at you! I'll just stick to Nursery Rhymes thank you".

"You swore at me in Creole!" he exclaimed, harking back to one of those moments in Sierra Leone when she had heard a certain description of a lady's anatomy whilst on her rounds and had to discretely inquire what it meant. When she had relayed the story to her husband, he had laughed and had forever teased her about the entirely innocent way she had said something so rude.

"No" she laughed quietly, shaking her head.

"Alright" he replied, with a mock roll of the eyes. "If you insist". He had found quite efficient ways of chipping down her barriers as time moved on but knew to do it slowly and carefully too.

"Peter?" she asked.

"Hmmm?"

"I…" she hesitated. "I just want to apologise"

"What for? You haven't done anything".

"No not that. I did do something", Chummy replied even frightening of bringing the subject up again. "I upset you this morning, yesterday morning" she corrected. "When I was pushing you about when Fred was born"

"Oh". She could hear the hesitance too in his voice.

"I am sorry Peter. I should know my place and I should have realised you didn't want to talk about it. I can be such a clot at times that I can't see beyond the end of my own nose" she pleaded, knowing that once again she had placed her foot firmly in it, ashamed it had taken her sisters in law to make her realise that of her own husband.

"Camilla its fine".

"No it isn't" she replied, feeling tears well, but forcing them back down as far as they would go.

"What did you say about not pushing?" he asked, sitting up and swinging his legs over the side of the recliner so he could face her. "Accept what I say Camilla that it's alright".

She looked up at him. "Yes, alright, I do" she nodded feeling his hands squeeze hers again.

"Is the baby asleep?" he asked, diverting the subject.

"Which one?" she quipped.

"The one that was running around with Rosie like he belonged in Bedlam" Peter said, tipping his head in the general direction of the cot on the other side of the bedroom.

"Dead to the world. One doesn't think anything is going to wake him after all the fresh air he's had today".

Peter smiled. "Is the second one asleep?"

"We had a little jig just before but no all's quiet on the Western Front there too" she replied, smoothing her hand across her nightdress, with that smile that she could not prevent when she thought about their second child in that conundrum of fear and excitement.

She still felt oddly nervous of him, scared that she had ventured onto subjects forbidden, but he moved across to sit next to her as he could see her thoughts written all over her face.

"It will be alright to ask one day. Just not now" he said.

Chummy swallowed and nodded her head turning so she was almost nose to nose with him.

"Believe me?" Peter asked.

"Of course" she smiled, leaning across to give him a peck on the lips.

"Do put my daughter down there young man!" they heard from down below them causing them both to jump.

"Jer-ry!" Chummy replied enunciating her brother's name with two syllables . "You know your impression of Pa was never as good as Ted's". She stood up, hands on the rail of the balcony seeing her brother walking around the grass with Theo, who was clearly still not happy.

"Is he alright?" she asked, her nephew red faced and looking somewhat annoyed.

"Yes, well, will be. Ruth can't do these blessed midnight walks anymore and he would insist on seeing the stars" Jeremy replied, sounding tired. It was almost two o'clock in the morning. "One thinks though that a quick walk is slowly working. Might take him back up".

The three parties whispered a 'goodnight' before Jeremy departed back into the house.

"Do you want to sit out for a bit more?" Peter asked as they continued to lean on the wooden balustrade.

"Yes, I think I would" she replied, going back to sit down on the second seat.

"No, no, no" he insisted, taking her hand. "Come here and sit with me".

Carefully they squeezed together on the single lounger, his arm thrown around her shoulder. She was as good as sitting on his hip in the space he insisted they occupy but he wasn't planning on complaining.

"Are you looking forward to the party?" she asked, taking up his left hand, winding her fingers in his as his other hand rested lightly on her bare arm. It would help to canvass an opinion from somebody else. She was worried enough as it is and talking to him always helped.

"Yes, I think so. Why not?"

"Oh", she replied, having been here so many times before. "It will be full of Pa's friends and their insufferable children talking about investments and other equally tedious topics".

"I do have a resolution for that you know", he said.

"Pray tell" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I'll just tell them about raiding brothels, getting booze thrown all over my uniform on a nightly basis and picking up young girls from the quayside" he announced.

"That should brighten things up!"


	10. Chapter 10

"Uh-oh! Uh-oh!" came a little voice from behind her as the clatter of something hit the stone floor in the hallway. Ronnie turned to find Freddie, fresh from an afternoon dip in bath that she had been stewarding before the arrival of the Callaghans, lid in hand, but content and cup splattered all over the floor.

"What was that young sir?" she asked, having picked up her sister in law's nickname.

"Uh-oh!" he repeated, doleful brown eyes staring up at her, knowing he had made a mess. "Me sorry".

Ronnie laughed lovingly at his apology for the milk that was now seeping into the cracks. "Do you know young man, for that apology, we will go and find a cloth and mop it up and say no more to your grandpa".

Freddie looked up at her and smiled following her to the kitchen.

"Was that him?" Peter asked as he found his sister in law on her knees in the hallway, son 'helping' her dabbing his own cloth onto the stone trying to copy his aunt.

Ronnie looked up and laughed. "Take after Chummy does he?"

"She rules him with an iron rod when it comes to apologising for his accidents, but no not really, he's not as bad as she can be at times!" Peter replied. He could see clearly his wife's almost desperation to ensure that her son was his own person; not like her forever scared of causing trouble, always thinking before doing and any time there was a spillage or the like she found herself telling him, almost involuntarily, that he had to apologise even though it was most of the time a simple accident.

"What are these sisters that are coming tonight like then?" Peter asked, taking the damp dishcloth off his son as he settled the boy on his hip.

"Never met them" Ronnie replied as she was helped from the floor. "Bob, from what he remembers of them, said that they seemed perfectly pleasant. One doesn't know how they are around children, but you know Pa-in-Law would never have the children at the party".

Peter nodded, accepting the truth, hearing behind him a bell ringing.

"That'll be them" Ronnie noted, going to walk back to the kitchen.

"That's a bit early" Peter noted, surprised, taking a quick look at his watch reading almost four o'clock as he followed her.

"It's to let us get ready apparently", Ronnie replied, taking the other dishcloth off him. "Pa in Law asked so we would have time".

Peter slipped the zip up the back of his wife's dress as she stood in front of the mirror, turning left and right, not convinced the maroon dress was the correct choice. She didn't say a word to him though; knowing she had to stop doubting and once in a while trust her own judgment.

"Thank you" she whispered smiling back at him, seeing his arms slide around her waist, over her stomach and his chin rest on her shoulder feeling something shift under his hand just for a brief moment.

"Did you feel that?" she asked voice low having felt the child move herself. She'd felt this one earlier this time. "I did" he responded smiling over her shoulder. "Was Fred alright when you left him?"

"Oh yes perfectly. The Callaghans brought colouring books and crayons with them so he was off like a shot!"

Peter sighed contentedly. "So this is the day we get to meet the elusive Mrs Hamilton?"

"Yes" Chummy replied, her hands across his arms, letting out a breath as well.

"What's she like?" he asked.

"Do you know she was always nice enough" she said fairly. "But she was the staff so Mater never really let us talk to her. Not have a proper conversation and by the time she settled in I was back in London".

Downstairs they could hear the front door bell again and again and a buzz of conversation. Peter smiled to himself.

"What?" Chummy asked, curious.

"I was just thinking" he said, releasing her and going to put on his jacket that had been hanging over the back of a chair. "Your Dad".

"What about him?" she asked, looking at herself in the mirror from side to side again, brushing down her dress and checking the collar was in place.

"Marrying the staff" he replied, seeing her in the mirror as she frowned at him.

"You married me and your father is following suit".

"You're not staff!" she replied quite aghast, even though she could see where he was coming from. It was something that she had not entirely thought about but yes, indeed, her father was marrying 'below himself' if there was such a thing possible.

"Marrying across class then" he said straightening out his jacket behind her.

"Don't say things like that". She turned and kissed him. "Just please don't. You have more class than anyone down there. You can have all the money in the world and still be entirely devoid of any taste or compassion for others. Please don't say it, Peter. One cannot bear it".

He wrapped his hands around her jaw, leaning up to return her kiss. He didn't need to say a word, his feelings for her expressed in one action. "Come on then" he said. "We have people to meet".

"Chummy?" came an inquisitive voice from behind her as she took her first and only glass of champagne from the sideboard as the party was starting to get into its swing.

She turned around to find a very familiar face. "Thomas?"

"The same" he replied with a smile stretching out his hand to shake hers. It had been firmly years since she had seen Thomas - Tom - Downey.

"One didn't expect to see you here!" she exclaimed, actually happy to see at least one of her father's guests.

"I have to say I didn't either, but Mother and Father were invited so I thought I would trip along for the ride! Care for a walk away from this noise? Got a bashing headache and that twinkly music is not helping" Tom announced, trying to be heard over the din of conversation and Mozart.

"I could fetch you some aspirin?" Chummy offered.

"Do you know that would be darling. Thank you". Tom took her glass and waited by the dining room door as she disappeared somewhere, coming back with two white pills in her hand.

"Are you meant to mix these with Champers?" he asked, throwing the pills down his throat and taking a hefty gulp from the flute in his hand.

"One doesn't think so!" she replied slightly alarmed, but far too late to stop him.

"Oh well!" he shrugged. "There's a nurse in the vicinity if it all goes up the creek!"

"You are nursing still?" he added quickly.

"Yes" she replied, a touch surprised he remembered. "Only part time though".

Her wedding ring caught his eye as she raised the glass to her lips, taking a sip of champagne too, as they walked towards the open floor to ceiling windows breathing in the warm evening air.

"I see Ma Browne got her wish" he nodded at her hand.

"Well" she paused, wondering whether she would received the raised eyebrows and relentless questions again. "One would quite go that far!"

"Oh?" Tom replied, suddenly curious as to her cryptic answer. She looked at him. "Mater didn't choose him".

"Well congratulations in any event" he smiled, clinking his glass against hers, always slightly fearful of asking anything about her mother and marriage in combination. "Where are you living?"

"London", Chummy replied as they made their way closer to the veranda so they could hear themselves think.

"Just thinking of moving myself back there too at some point before Christmas" he noted. "The old work is drying up in Spain for some reason and it's time for a fresh start methinks. When was it we first met?"

Chummy thought for a second. "1948". When she thought about it, yes, it was during that time before her mother gave up the ghost of trying to arrange a suitable marriage for her daughter. "Wasn't it someone's birthday party?"

"Yes, one does believe you are right", he replied. "Can't for the life of me remember who though!"

"Me neither" she shrugged with a smile, not particularly being bothered either as it was clearly such a memorable event for them both!

"I em" Tom started, knowing he had to broach the subject one way or another. "I was sorry to hear about your Ma and her passing so suddenly".

"Thank you" Chummy replied. She had stopped crying months ago over her mother; a new baby taking precedence. No-one asked any more; no-one expressed their condolences and her ashes were in the familial vault at St Margaret's, a place that chilled Chummy to her very middle.

"You know she was always a good egg to me". It was the truth after all; well most of the time.

"Yes I know. I'm surprised she never tried to pair us off quite frankly" Chummy replied. Tom Downey had been in all likelihood the only male acquaintance or friend she had had that had not been a prospective suitor.

"I know why Chums" he said. "Do you remember when Father went to work in New York?"

"When you were living in Dorset?" she said, taking a sip, seeing Peter outside having a rather animated conversation with a friend of her brothers.

"Yes that's the one" he confirmed taking another flute of champagne from the sideboard behind her.

"I do remember. I remember Pa saying something that he'd gone so quickly and it was all a bit of a shock so it must have been a fantastic post".

"Yes well" Tom hesitated, briefly coughing at the irony of it all. "That's why I was persona non grata as a potential son in law"

"Why?" she asked, wondering why on earth his father's profession excluded him in the eyes of her mother.

"Father wasn't in New York. He was in the old nick" Tom declared.

"Jail?!" she whispered quietly, making sure that nobody was within earshot.

"Hmmm" Tom replied. "Fraud" he enunciated rolling his tongue around the letter 'r'. "Swindled the partners in his business out of thousands he did".

Chummy smiled realising. "Yes, so you were highly unsuitable!"

"Mind you, it did allow me freedom of choice to marry who I liked and when I liked" he nodded, not casting any aspersions on Chummy at all and she did not take his comments in any other way than an innocent statement.

"So you are married?" she asked.

"No!" he laughed. "Wouldn't catch me doing something like that! Enjoy my travelling far too much to be tethered to one place. So how long have you been spliced then?"

"Three years next month" she replied, thoroughly looking forward to the arrangements they had already made - a visit with Freddie to the dining rooms where they had spent hours and hours when they were going on dates and where they saw as their own special place. Where they fell in love.

"Children?" he said gesturing, clearly seeing she was expecting.

"Two" she replied, smiling. "Well will be two soon. Little chap upstairs and then this one", she replied, baby now quiet after the burst of activity upstairs, responding, she would like to believe to his or her father's touch.

"So which one's yours then?" Tom asked, looking around to try to locate what was seemingly an absent husband.

"Out there" she gesturing to where Peter was standing half way down the garden. "In the blue suit talking to Emmie and Jimmy Hayes".

"Well if that's the case and if the lady would excuse me", he said reaching around her to pluck a fresh bottle of champagne from the dresser. "It's time one introduced oneself".

He was about to step away when he turned back. "Do you know it is so lovely to see you. After all this time". He tapped her on the elbow and was gone.

Chummy sighed. Perhaps she would run upstairs for five minutes to see how Fred was doing. It was almost his bed time and everyone else seemed just so engaged in conversation that it might be an imposition if she interrupted.

As soon as she put one foot on the stairs she heard her name.

"Camilla?"

She turned to find her prospective step mother standing in the doorway to the sitting room and her heart flipped at the sight of her. So unlike her mother and so unlike she remembered her.

"I" Margaret said, moving forward to the woman who was stock still on the stairs. "I wondered if we may speak?"


	11. Chapter 11

"I'm just going upstairs to see my son. We can speak on the way". It came out rather more terse than Chummy quite expected but the woman followed her standing as she tapped on the door of where she knew Freddie was with the rest of his cousins.

"Hello dear" Mary Callaghan said as she opened the door. "Come in!" she announced, waving both women into the room.

To her surprise the children were all calm and occupied. Freddie himself had not registered his mother was there, so engrossed in his cousin Gregory's reading of a storybook. Chummy could hear snippets of 'Noddy Goes to Toyland' as Gregory's audience started to grow and for a moment she watched him, eyes wide, entirely engaged in his cousin's storytelling.

"Freddie?" Mary asked walking with Chummy over to the group of children. "Are you not going to say hello to your Mummy?"

A head shot around, sandy hair bouncing as he realised who was in the room. He stood up and half ran to her arms outstretched. One thing she could never get over was how keen he was each and every time to see her and when she thought about it, it was overwhelming. There had been many a time she had wondered whether she had ever run to her parents like that, bright eyes, hankering after a cuddle or a kiss. When she thought about it the answer was probably a firm 'no'. Her son would know different.

"Would you like to come and sit with Mummy on the balcony, Freds?" she asked, smoothing her hand down the soft skin of his cheek.

The boy nodded enthusiastically, the story forgotten. "Come on then, you can come and sit with us. I'll bring him back in time for bed" Chummy noted to the sisters seeing it was almost half past seven.

Little was said as she, Fred and Margaret walked to the back of the building, through her father's study to the small balcony. Chummy settled herself with Fred across her knee and waited. She was not sure what to say to break the ice and decided to let her almost stepmother do it. It was her that approached Chummy after all.

"I wanted to speak to you alone", Margaret started, smiling at Freddie who was nestling against his mother's chest, taking his hand; his mother resisting separating the two. "I wanted to speak to you as I know you were the only one with your mother at the end".

Chummy swallowed.

"I can see why you might feel awkward to suddenly find me under your father's roof".

"No" Chummy replied. "One doesn't".

"No?" Margaret asked, perhaps having expected some kind of resistance and been prepared for it.

"No", Chummy repeated. "One cannot feel awkward or whichever description you choose to say. You said it correctly. This is Father's roof. We had a home where family lived. This was not a family home to us. I have my own now and whatever Pa wishes to do, he will do with little say so from me or my brothers. He has already made that clear".

"I would like your blessing though and even though I know your Father will say opposite, he would like to have that too. I can assure you it is important to me as you are all important to me".

Chummy nodded. She was in a rather peculiar place. Despite that she had made up with her Mother, or at least as far as those last few days would let her, the deep down emotional connection was still somehow dangling in the wind. The daughter had said the words 'I love you' but she had not heard it in return as her mother took her last breath. She would never hear that now and in the grief that she felt these past weeks and months, something had resolved itself ; a decision that she had to let the past be past and realise that those words would simply never pass her mother's lips in life or in prospect of death. Chummy had however, for the first time in her life, begun to understand that person her mother was and began to learn about herself into the bargain. Mrs Hamilton had probably said more to her on an emotional level in these last few moments than her mother had said all her life.

"I have know you since you were how old?" Margaret asked.

"18, 19" Chummy noted.

"And now married and a mother" she mused. She had witnessed this poor girl be forced from assignation to assignation and had seen the defeat in those deep brown eyes. How she wished it was her place to say something; show her that there was another route. Thankfully, she had found it.

Chummy decided to brace herself. "Is your daughter my half sister?"

"Josephine?" Margaret replied, quietly. "No, she is not. I can assure you she is not. Your father and I were not close until after your mother died. You can take that as the truth".

Chummy nodded, accepting, as she had no choice to, that she was mistaken in that glance she had seen of the other girl some years ago.

"Did Pa ask you to speak to me?" she asked.

"He" Margaret started. "He doesn't know where to begin Camilla. He wonder's whether its too late".

"It's not too late" she whispered quietly, fighting tears from tiredness and the tiny scraps of light she was beginning to see from this journey to Madeira wondering whether after all she could construct a relationship with her father as it was meant to be.

"When your mother died, in time, he realised how unsatisfactory matters are between you all. Realised what he didn't have. I think it was a catalyst to his proposal to me and your invitations to this wedding".

Chummy nodded, not knowing what to say.

"He realises that a simple visit will not bridge these gaps Camilla but he would like to start. He will find it somewhat difficult after all this time and he…" Margaret paused. "does genuinely wish to…" She was struggling now.

"To make up for a multitude of years of absence?" Chummy asked, successfully stripping back any trace of sarcasm.

"Yes" Margaret replied. "I appreciate that it might not be possible. Remember I lived under the same roof too for many years with you all at differing times. He understands now Camilla. I have seen to that".

Chummy looked up at the woman who was to be a mother figure to her.

"Your father struggles to express himself. I do not" she concluded.

Chummy knew that was the truth. He'd been a stranger for too many years and whilst in her heart of hearts she yearned for a parent's love, accepting might feel so unworldly that words refused to come and it would seem that her father was the same.

"Think about what is to be said Camilla; what he will say in years to come. Not what has been done as it will only serve to make your heart heavy".

Her words spun in her head as she tucked her son into his cot. The Callaghans were staying the night, apparently, and Fred's cot had been transported to the room where the children would all sleep, set up she thought like a school dormitory.

"Are you going to be good for Mary and Grace tonight?" she asked. "One is awfully sorry it's so hot". The boy wasn't listening as he was rapidly descending into sleep as she straightened his vest. No pyjamas tonight.

"What do you think about the whole bally mess then Freds?" she asked, needing someone to just listen to her ramble. Peter was downstairs somewhere and the last thing she wanted to do was fill his night with her moans and groans.

"Your granddad wants to make amends and your Mamma has no idea what she should be thinking".

"I think" came a voice from around the door, "we should perhaps give him the benefit of the doubt".

"Will?" Chummy noted her brother walk into the room. She had left the door open deliberately to allow the air to flow. "Did you hear all of that?"

"One did" he replied, walking to her side.

"What do you think?" she asked him, seeing him take up Fred's teddy bear from the foot of the cot.

"Emmie and I see him day to day" Will said. "One thinks as a consequence we are somewhat closer, if that is the correct word, to him than we used to be. He regrets old girl. You can see it in his face if you saw him every day. We had no idea he was planning on marrying Mrs Hamilton. She was there in the house all the time and one thinks she has been a comfort to him in trying times".

"He was so cold Will. When I spoke to him to tell him that Mater had died, it was like I was telling him that I'd broken a plate". It was a terrible analogy but it would have to do. "It was as though he simply did not care. Married for almost 50 years and it was as though there was nothing".

"At the end old girl. There wasn't" Will replied, having borne witness to the icy atmosphere and the vast gulf between his parents, straightening the bow around the bear's neck. "When Mother left she just upped to London. She told us she was going and we thought it was her usual visits, but the first thing we knew was when you telephoned Pa to say she was with you. Pa was furious that she just decided to go without explanation and apparently finally so he cut her off".

"As time passed though, one thinks he has had time to reflect. He had no concept she was ill" he concluded.

"She had to hide it", Chummy revealed, taking the bear off her brother and passing it to her son who gripped it tightly. "If we had been closer she could have talked to me; I could have helped her. If only to help manage the pain if there was no medical treatment. It could have made her last weeks _easier_".

"Emmie and I talked on the subject for hours and we concluded that he must be given the opportunity if only for the grandchildren's sake even with everything that's gone before".

Chummy nodded. Maybe this time she could have more time with him than she did with her mother. He was getting on in years too and she would like some memories of her father that were not of a trail of cigar smoke, a gruff voice, doors slamming or plain indifference at her presence.

"Can you let Peter know I'm up here? Just until Fred goes off" she asked.

"Of course I will". Will reached across and kissed his sister on her cheek and left her be. It had pleased all of the brother's that their sister was happy, at last, and perhaps now the family could move forward for the sake of the future.


	12. Chapter 12

She could hear downstairs the party still going on, music, laughter and lights danced across the lawn as she watched from her perch on the balcony that led from their bedroom. As she stood by the open window drinking in the cooling night air she felt no desire to go there; to go downstairs and mingle. Sometimes life was better in observation rather than participation. There were too many things spinning in her mind to talk of old times, weddings or the endless small talk that she was expected to make but still struggled so desperately with.

"Will said you were just up here until Fred fell asleep" came a familiar voice from behind her, so lost she had not heard the door squeak open or the feet on the wooden floor. "That was hours ago", Peter said, sliding his arms underneath hers to hold her close.

"I know" she replied, voice low as she turned her head towards him. "One just needed to think and….Did anyone notice?" She would be surprised if people did.

"I did and _yes_ people noticed" he pressed, still altogether shocked that she would think their fellow guests would overlook her presence or lack thereof. "Ruth sent me up to find you as they were worried that you were alright. Emmie said she saw you talking to her".

"I'm fine" she said, kissing his cheek. "Margaret and I talked, and think she will be good for him. She isn't afraid of speaking her mind". That was the one thing that her family – her birth family - were seemingly incapable of doing. An inability to voice their innermost thoughts and perhaps it would take her to enrapture her father to the extent that he would begin to open up. It had taken Peter for her and still there were time when he did not did succeed.

Peter smiled, pleased at the concession. "Do you think you can talk to him now?"

"I'd like to", she replied, resolved at least for this moment that a talk with him would be a good thing.

"I'm glad" Peter replied, leaning across her kissing her deeply, left hand drifting in circles over her protruding stomach.

"No!" she cursed quietly. "People can see!"

She pushed him back into the room out of sight and he almost lost his balance, champagne still swilling around his blood; the swift shove not doing his spinning head any favours. He knew he had had too much to drink, needed to brush his teeth and have a wash. Peter smiled sleepily at her.

"Are you up here for good?" she asked, seeing he looked tired; perhaps more drunk, but definitely tired.

"No" he replied, taking a step back towards her, sliding his hand around her neck. "Up here for the bad!" He kissed her again.

"Get rid of the taste of Whiskey and one'll consider it", she said taking hold of his chin and affectionately pushing him away again.

She smiled as he walked away to the bathroom. How weak willed she was around him but it was the most wonderful thing.

"Don't fall asleep on me!"

"I won't " Chummy replied pulling back the bedcovers and setting about getting changed.

They did not converse over the rush of water as he washed and brushed his teeth but by the time he had finished, she was lying diagonally on top of the covers, far too warm to creep underneath. He too had lost his suit somewhere between the bathroom and the point where he fell face down on the bed. Peter noticed that she had pulled across the muslin curtains but left the doors open as otherwise they would simply not be able to breathe.

"What do you think?" she asked as he raised his head.

"I think" he said propping his chin up with his hand. "I love you".

"Behave" she scolded, entirely unable to prevent the smile that followed. "No" she continued. "Do I talk to him? Can I talk to him after everything that's been said and done?" She was starting to doubt herself again; such a flip flop of emotions playing through her mind when it came to her family. It was half a rhetorical question.

"Do you want to?" he asked as she felt his lips touch her shoulder.

"Yes" she nodded.

"Come here then!" he joked, knowing full well she was talking about conversing with her father rather than falling into his arms.

"One's trying to have a serious conversation Peter!"

"I know", he smiled. "Talk to him then. What harm can it do? Really? I know you well enough that underneath it all, you will regret it if you don't".

She nodded. "If he mentions it again do you want me to accept the Trust fund being handed over to you?"

Peter swallowed. "I never married you for money".

"I know you didn't. I didn't have any the moment we were engaged!" she smiled, but was troubled. "Tell me what to do Peter...I will do what you tell me to". For the first time in well, ever, she was entirely prepared to capitulate to whatever a man wanted with no terms attached.

"If he does, tell him to remove the clause that I have control over it and it goes in your name alone. It's your money, you were left it and I don't see why I should be telling you what to do with it…or not as the case may be".

"Mater was furious" she noted. "She called Grandpa a demented old goat for leaving the money to me, but he was the sanest man I knew". Chummy remembered that day well – her 18th birthday – when her grandfather had announced to all and sundry that he had changed his Will, leaving every penny in the rather overstuffed bank account to his grand-daughter. She had a vague idea of how much was in there and it was all too ridiculous to contemplate.

_"__Those reckless boys have had enough money thrown at them over the years and now it's the girl's turn!"_

Her beloved Grandpa had as good as told his son and daughter in law precisely where they could place themselves and all the guests could see the veins in Lady Browne's neck bulge as the pronouncement sunk in. One thing that Chummy always remembered about her Grandpa was his incessant, sometimes and only occasionally jovial, irritation that her brothers were held in such high esteem and the only daughter seemed to be an afterthought. That was when, between them she presumed, her parents cooked up the preposterous clause that would perhaps never allow their daughter free access to her inheritance.

"One does suppose if he agrees, it will show if he thinks I have any mettle about me at all" she pondered, crossing her hands over her belly.

"You have plenty of mettle believe me Camilla. You put the fear of God into me sometimes!" Peter replied, eyes wide.

"Do I?" she asked, turning to him, actually quite appalled that he of all people may think that.

"Yes" he replied, straight-faced. "I still have this recurring dream of you hurtling towards me on that bicycle!"

Chummy tutted. "Are you going to be difficult all night?"

"You know me Camilla" he replied.

"We had nothing Peter. We were poor. _Are_ poor. Money opened doors for us; that's all it did." She sighed, audibly, again.

"If he thinks that money will buy your affection, you do know what you ought to be doing" Peter noted, but wondering whether she would be brave enough to do so. It was much easier to look from the outside in.

"I do" she replied sadly. "Except one is not sure he is capable of just saying how he feels and one wonders, if we do speak.." she paused. "No, we _must _speak if it will bridge some of the gap".

"You know I'll make it better Camilla if I can" he said, running the pad of a finger down her arm. "Me, Fred, this little one. I can't see the scars you have, but we'll try to make them better".

"Don't make me cry!" she said, voice wobbling, resting her hand on her stomach, baby now typically waking up.

"Fred used to do that" she mused. "Wake up the moment I want some peace. Here".

She took his hand and placed it just to the left of her navel. Peter smiled as he felt the tap tap underneath his palm.

"Some days I wonder if Pa might have done that. Just rested his hand and felt one of us moving". Peter had in reality no answer to that; a thought far too intimate and frankly the thought of her mother giving birth sent his skin prickling.

Those times in Sierra Leone, when it was too hot to sleep too and they would just lie there and indulge in Fred moving around wondering boy or girl. Those times when she would try to sleep and find her husband lying beside her prodding her stomach, a hand or a foot pushing back at him.

_"__Are you two going to do that all blasted night?"_

She thought perhaps, he might not be interested unless he was presented with a son and then, in time, he would become vague and elusive like her father. It was foolish, she should have known that, but something nestled in the back of her mind. That snippet of conversation she had heard year upon year ago; her mother and somebody discussing yet another match.

_"__No doubt though that if it came to children she will produce girls!"_

She had felt strong enough to tell him of that comment when with some surprise, washing dishes in the run-down kitchen of their Sierra Leonean house, she had felt – not the usual flickering butterflies - but that first, swift, strong kick of her son. The exclamation he thought was pain it took her that much by surprise and with relief, he had been fascinated by the ripples under her skin and had expressed no preference.

She could never imagine it; never for one minute think of her parents lying like they were. Perhaps they did; perhaps one day long ago her parents were in love like this – they must have been – and been excited about new life to come. Perhaps by the time she was born, birth was a chore to her mother and child after child had come along in search of that little girl who never, after all, did conform to expectation after all the effort.

"Camilla?" he asked quietly

"Hmmm?" she replied, distracted by her whirring mind.

"Talk to your Dad before the wedding. I heard Bob say he was planning an excursion for the family tomorrow – just up into the hills again but it might be your only chance before we go back".

Chummy took a deep breath, filling her lungs to the brim. "I will. I must" she underlined, seeing him shift slightly up the bed towards her. As she closed her eyes, indulging in the feel of breath on her skin one thought swam in her mind.

_Maybe it was all worth it after all to get to here. Just maybe.  
_


	13. Chapter 13

"Drink brother mine?"

Ted looked up, head heavy and eyes weary, at his brother waving a half open bottle of flat champagne in his face, noting Will too looking worse for wear to his right.

"Bugger off Jerry" Ted replied, rubbing his palm across his face, voice hoarse from what must have been packets upon packets of cigarettes smoked last night. One thing Ted Browne liked to do too was talk and his voice had been truly exercised last night.

"You pair look a bally wreck!" Jerry noted, sitting on a spare seat in the dining room where his brother had decided to reside.

"You don't look too healthy yourself" Ted retorted, looking vaguely up at his sibling, head aching against the early morning sunlight.

"I feel like I've been dug up" Will noted as he slumped down.

"There's gallons of champagne left…" Ted observed. "I told Pops he'd bought too much of the stuff. One knows we Browne boys can drink but…When Will and I brought it all back from town we thought we'd have to go some to get all of it down people's necks!" He gestured vaguely at his brother.

"One doesn't wish to see another bottle for at least…." Jerry considered before he was interrupted.

"A day or two?" Will joked as the three laughed.

"So what's this trip up into the hills for then?" Jerry asked, having been told by Ruth that the excursion was planned and no amount of pleading would ensure his escape.

"Who the Hell knows!" Ted noted. "Familial bonding?" he asked. "Well if you would pardon me brother one is cynical" he concluded firmly.

Jerry and Will could not help but agree.

"See you three have emerged then?!" came another voice from behind them, both turning to see George walking towards them, looking mightily more nimble than his brothers.

"Where's the women?" he asked, seeing the three grim faces. "Lexia was up and away before I even had the chance to see if there was bacon on the go for brekkie".

"Sandwiches and all that ridiculous picnic catastrophe for the excursion. They're all in the kitchen fussing around like a group of demented hens. Came out here to avoid the chatter". Ted paused. "Pa's gone off somewhere"

"I know" George replied, he too sitting down sideways on a dining chair. "Saw him drive off with Bob. Blooming engine screeching woke me up!"

Behind them they heard a door click and Peter walked through, a plate of perfectly cut toast in his hand.

"Where did that come from?! I was chucked out of the kitchen!" Jerry noted.

"Ah!" Peter replied. "Advantages of offering my services to your wife!"

"What's she been batting her eyelashes over now?" Jerry asked.

"Putting the fold up tables away into the cellar after last night" he replied, offering the plate around. "Camilla was going to do it but I'm not having her lifting and carrying or creeping around in the dark down there". He too sat down.

"Saved us a job!" Ted noted, stomach growling as he devoured the half slice of toast he had taken.

"So what time are we meant to be ship shape for this trek then?" George asked, having not particularly spoken to his wife that morning to ascertain very much at all.

"Ronnie said as soon as Pops was back from wherever he was back from, offspring dressed and lined up for inspection and then we were going" Jerry noted, having briefly seen his sister in law that morning before he was thrown bodily out of the kitchen by several women all at once. Other times he might have been quite glad to be manhandled in such a manner.

"Speaking of children, it's awfully quiet", George replied.

"They're all still upstairs, having breakfast" Peter noted. "Heard them all singing on the way down".

_"If you go down to the woods today  
You're sure of a big surprise.  
If you go down to the woods today  
You'd better go in disguise"._

"Think one'll take those sisters back to Paris with us" George observed. "Keeping fourteen children in line is quite the feat!"

"Uncle Will?" came a voice from behind them all.

"Genevieve!" he replied. "What can we do for you this fine and sunny morning?"

"Mummy asked if you can see if Grandpa put the picnic baskets and blankets he bought in the garage. She said you'd know where the key was" she inquired.

"That I do" Will noted. "Come on, fresh air will do me good". He clapped Ted across the shoulder. "Get up and help us, you lazy oik!"

Ted dragged himself up and followed his brother.

"So are we all in agreement that Pops seemed to be quite the chipper chap last night?" Jerry asked as they left.

"He was more talkative, I'll give him that!" George noted. "Never seen anything quite like it". It had disconcerted him too.

Peter could not really comment, having only met his father in law once before this visit and somewhat prejudiced in his honest opinion, having only heard negativity from his wife.

"Quite glad he didn't go off and start making one of his interminable speeches though" Jerry said. "The one on Ted's 21st was something else!"

"Oh good Lord" George recalled, laughing as much as aching head would led him. "Imagine that again…."

Jerry snorted at the memory. "Two hours later Peter…._Two hours_ we are standing their like lemons hearing him pontificate about how Ted was going to change the world!"

"Shame he couldn't see into the future!" George noted. "Teddy will never change anything…Not sure he can even manage his own socks!"

All three men laughed but did not see Chummy walk into the room.

"Good grief Sissy!" George scolded seeing her suddenly standing beside him. "Don't creep up on a gang of hung-over men like that!"

"I didn't creep up and you know it. Peter, could you go and help move Fred's cot back into our room? It's not fair for the sisters to do it".

"Theo's too?" he asked, getting up, feeling far better after scoffing some of the haul of toast.

"No. His own father can do that!" Chummy exclaimed, looking pointedly at Jerry.

"Nag, nag, nag" Jerry bemoaned. "You women are all the same".

"Come on old chap" he continued, gesturing over at Peter. "Best skedaddle before we get asked to do anything else!"

Chummy gave her brother a blank look and Peter a smile before she sat next to George. She was uncomfortable this morning. Baby had shifted into the strangest position nestled into her hip and butterflies were fluttering in the pit of her stomach at the prospect of the time she knew she would have to take with her father today.

"Enjoy last night? George asked.

"Yes" Chummy replied. "I did".

"Glad to see old Tom was there. He said Pops had got in touch with his parents after Ma died. You do know why he disappeared off the ledge?" George asked, suddenly unsure as he had not really seen hide nor hair of his sister last night.

"Yes, he told me".

"Strange that" George ruminated. "Tom was always such a good pal to us and one always though that Ma and Pops were the best of friends with his old ones"

"Well, one imagines Mater was the one driving the separation" Chummy noted, knowing of the reason and her father seemingly consciously putting himself back in touch with old friends.

"And he apparently made the telephone call to them" George noted. "Tom was saying his Pa was quite surprised, but pleased too".

Chummy smiled, digesting her brother's news. "Maybe things are changing".

"Daddy?"

To their side, George and his sister saw his son Thomas holding tight onto his sister Caroline's hand.

"We can't find Mummy and Caroline's been sick" the boy announced.

"Where?" George asked exasperated.

"In the plant pot by the stairs" Thomas replied, Caroline looking meek and really quite white beside him. Chummy had to stop herself laughing at her brother's face, not at first realising that the look of absolute death was real.

"George, go into the kitchen" Chummy said, standing up, also realising her brother was not intent on moving. "There's some peppermint cordial in the cupboard and just put a couple of drops into some water for Caroline and then go and clean it up before anyone comes back".

"You're a nurse!" he replied, actually quite astounded his sister had asked him to go. "You deal with vomiting children on a daily basis!"

"No I don't and _you _are her _father_!" Chummy spat back at him through gritted teeth. "Tommy go and take her into the fresh air and Daddy will bring the cordial through".

Chummy turned the children around to walk into the garden, giving them a helpful push on the way. "When Daddy brings it through" she repeated, "only little sips. Can you do that for me?"

"I can" Thomas replied, brimming with responsibility for his five years as Chummy turned her head and shot her brother another look of venom. She could tell he was cursing her as she sighed at his back.

_"__Dear, dear Sis, your husband's too soft with you"._

Peter was in the middle of dressing Freddie, having moved his cot back into their bedroom. The boy was sitting on their bed, with a light shirt and trousers being fitted to him as his father knelt down and slipped on his son's sandals. Fred had tried and succeeded with one button but promptly gave up when the second became far too complicated.

"Mamma!" the boy announced, stretching out a hand to where Chummy was standing by the door, watching the spectacle.

"Hello" Peter said, noting the slight scowl on his wife's face. "Are you alright?"

"Oh yes" she said, breaking out of her mood. "Just ticked off for a moment with George".

"Why?"

"Caroline's managed to be sick and he as good as point blank expected me to clear it up" he said walking across the room.

Peter frowned. "And I would guess you refused?"

"Correct" she replied, sitting down next to Freddie on the bed as he kicked his legs, now shoed, ready to go and bordering on beside himself ahead of the trip out. "He just reminded me, for one minute, of Pa when Ted was ill. He vomited all over himself and all over the dining table. Pa made him stand in his filthy clothes as punishment". Ever so gently she brushed the boy's hair as he smiled up at her.

"That's horrible".

"That was Pa" she replied, sighing. "Peter?"

He was now doing up Fred's shirt buttons with the boy watching in fascination. "Why do you do as much as you do for Fred?"

It struck Peter immediately what an odd question it was but he went with the flow.

"Because I want to" he said simply, looking up at her from his knees. "He's my son and I like spending time with him, even if it is filthy nappies or soaking me when he's the one having a bath". He stood up and transported the boy to his knee, sitting down on the bed.

"Camilla, there was one day, several days, when I thought it was only going to be me and him and…" he paused. "I can't hold him at arm's length because of it". Peter was not entirely sure it made sense but there it was. "I _need_ to know him because if I don't, I lose. I might have lost twice over".

She smiled, leant over and kissed him, primarily in thanks and for once neither felt interfering hands or objections from the boy who had crawled from his father's lap to his mother's mid kiss.

"Knock! Knock!" came a female voice from behind them. "Oh! Whoops!" Ronnie exclaimed, embarrassed, but happy as well to see what whatever had troubled them from the conversation on the hill the other day was well and truly forgotten.

"It's quite alright" Chummy noted turning around to see her sister in law in the doorway.

"Just a messenger here" she said. "Pa in law is after us going so come on!"


	14. Chapter 14

The early morning sun was scorching as the group collected themselves together, a wave of apprehension evident as Sir Rex led them towards the cars. He had decided to take them a little further afield than original plans and it involved a drive. A after piling into the cars, children on knees, they had been delivered to their destination.

Standing out on the pavement, Peter felt a hand slip into his right elbow, expecting Camilla but finding Ruth. Another slipped into his left elbow.

"We're kidnapping you!" Emmie whispered, the owner of the other hand. "We need a Policeman to escort us to make sure we don't get ourselves into a fix!"

Peter smiled, knowing perfectly well that whilst Ruth might have needed assistance, Emmie certainly did not. That said, there were no objections as they began to walk slowly up the hill.

Freddie was perched on his uncle Ted's shoulders a few yards further up and Chummy was somewhere behind, carrying a picnic blanket over her arms.

The children who could ran on ahead with the little ones lingering around aunts, uncles or parents as everybody broke into their own conversations. Sir Rex, with Margaret on his arm, was striding ahead, leading the way.

"One thought" he announced to the group, "that we might lunch at a spot on the top that we found some weeks ago. Wonderful view!"

None of the children with him thought to object and a few passed looks between them.

The air started to become dryer as they walked, but Chummy was determined not to slow the group down. She felt a touch better today; less tired and the sun was doing her wonders and she felt all at peace. Strangely. She was watching Freddie from bouncing on her brother's shoulders, to being swung by the hands between Ted and Jerry and collecting a rock that she would later find in their suitcase back home in Poplar.

Peter too, escorting his sisters in law. She watched him too; how he seemed to fit with these people who, to her even though they were family, still had that element of being strangers. For a moment it struck her. Was it her? Was she the reason she felt this way? Peter had always been more outgoing than her, equally at times as gauche, but he could strike up a conversation with anyone.

"You alright Sissy?" George said, having noted his sister seemed miles away as he walked beside her. "You look as though you need a rest!"

"No" she smiled, feeling it was entirely false. Putting off the inevitable was only going to make it worse. "I'm fine". There you go again, she thought.

"Your Pa was right" Ronnie whispered to her husband as they gathered and sat to eat, scattered around. "It is rather beautiful up here".

"Where is Pops?" Bob asked, looking around themselves. "Haven't seen him in a while".

"He's erm… " Ronnie hesitated.

"Vronny?"

"He's…"

"Veronica Lilian Browne as your husband one expects no secrets". He was only half teasing her.

Ronnie tutted. "He's having a quiet talk with Chummy".

"Oh", Bob noted. "So that is why Emmie has been glued to Peter's side since we arrived?"

"Yes. Pa in law asked so he could speak to her alone".

Her father had approached her when she was alone as she could be. She had slipped back to one of the cars to collect Freddie's sun hat as he was becoming far too pink cheeked as he ran around and she had closed the car door to find her father walking down the short path. She smiled hesitantly.

"That for the boy?" her father had asked, gesturing to the white sailor hat in her hands.

"Yes Pa". She had gone to walk past him back up to the family when he had placed his hand on her arm.

"One wonders if we may have a few minutes?"

They had walked to another clearing, somewhere her father obviously knew was there and he gestured for her to sit down on a bench. He remained standing and took a settling breath.

"No doubt your husband told you that I had mentioned your Trust fund". Here we go.

"Yes Pa he did and I…."

"Now I would like you to hear me out before you comment." She was commuted to silence. Again.

"Your mother and me always thought that your career was to be your marriage when a real engagement was not forthcoming. We had aspirations and plans and we received little co-operation from you despite you knowing our expectations of you so we resigned ourselves. There were opportunities for you but our hopes were sadly dashed more times than I would care to consider". He took a breath. "But now, a match has been created". It was though he was narrating a story about strangers.

Chummy swallowed. "Pa, I could not live if I was forced into a marriage that did not suit me". With Peter she was never alone. Even when their shifts induced hit and miss contact with each other, she was always with him.

"This was never about you but one thinks you realise that" her father continued. "This was about what your Mother and me intended for you and it seems you defied us. Your husband's lack of ranking disturbed us when we learned of it. One supposes though, when reflecting, that one should be grateful the marriage took place".

Chummy was confused and her father saw the look that crossed her face.

"By that I mean that he was still of such sufficient moral station after all to stand by you, as used goods, that he….."

"I'm _his _used goods Pa!" she interrupted, glad that the rest of the family were not within earshot, almost immune though to her father's lack of subtlety. She didn't dare tell him that she was the driving force that night, reasoning behind it that she wanted him desperately to know she loved him, was sorry for her actions and it was the only way she knew how. Peter had later freely admitted to her that he had been surprised when the kisses and wandering hands had resulted in the walk to his bedroom.

_"__So you objected?!"_

_"__No!"_

Her father turned to her, seeing her sitting down, resisting standing up and walking away, for this conversation was to, had to, happen no matter how uncomfortable it might be.

"One knows that we may never have the most conducive of relationships Camilla".

_'__Why has he started calling me by my proper name?' she thought._

"Pa…"

"No. I will finish" he said, still standing four or five feet away from her. "One has often wondered over these years if I had acted differently whether one could have influenced your status, your future and if we had allowed freer access to your Fund you may have attracted a more suitable environment to live in".

"Father" Chummy started, a steel appearing in her voice. "I have a house that suits me perfectly and a son who will run to me when he's scared, tired or just plain happy to see me. I have a husband who is not so stuffy to tell me every day that he loves me. No amount of money will buy that. I'd rather be penniless like you left Mater than have children who cannot even look me in the eye!"

She hadn't expected to say that, but it struck a nerve. "I'm sorry" she said, backtracking.

"No" her father replied. "You speak some truth and that I have come to realise. Margaret's children…they talk to her; laugh with each other. Freely and healthily. I have become buried in a way what one is losing one's grip of his family and no matter how much I bluster of why we were so disturbed by this relationship you have founded…" He took a breath. "One ought to have known that you…one ought to have realised that you were capable of deciding for yourself and that you know what is best for yourself. One sees that you are settled".

"I would like us to be friends. Even if we are on a somewhat irretrievable footing as father and daughter, one would like to think we can converse, and visit and I may see my grandchildren on a regular basis and for you all to come here when you wish for a holiday. I will pay for any passages".

A thought struck her. "Why did you pay for us to come here?"

"It is a reality that if not, you could not have travelled?"

Chummy nodded having to make that admission.

"But one wished to include my whole family and one felt that I ought to take the expedient way. There was no agenda. Will you grant me that there was no agenda other than your presence?"

"Yes Pa".

"And I would like you to give serious consideration to you having access to your funds".

"No".

"Speak to your husband. He will decide what is best for you". Something burned in her blood for a split second. Despite all these assertions that he wished to form a relationship, she was still put firmly in her place. She would be talking to Peter about it regardless and they would form a decision. Together.

"One is also….grateful that you took your mother in" he said. "That after it all, you cared for her. As much as your mother and me had been distant, I am comforted she was being cared for appropriately".

Chummy looked up at him. "Peter took her in. _He_ made sure". She did not want to tell her father about that terrible nursing home.

Her father nodded. "Perhaps each day we can learn something new. Perhaps moral fibre is more important, do you not think?"

The family returned home in the late afternoon, Peter only having been able to ascertain from his wife that he would tell her later of the conversation with her father. He knew it was his son's nap time and both he, Theo and Camilla had disappeared.

Peter gently opened the bedroom door, hearing no sound from within. Nobody talking or moving about. As he stepped instead the sight that greeted him made him smile.

Fred and Theo asleep, Camilla asleep with both boys snuggled up to her and each other. He crept around the side of the bed, leaning down to remove his shoes. A nap sounded wonderful and his wife, son and nephew were setting a very good example. He lay down gently, winding his arm over her middle and breathed in the scent of Chanel No 5; borrowed from Ronnie, but he decided he liked it.

However long later it was, Chummy realised, that whilst Fred and Theo had not moved from under the arm that was protecting them, she too was being held and whoever it was that was holding her, in the haze of sleep, had woken up too. In the silence of the room, she recounted her conversation with her father to Peter in great detail, feeling a weight that had settled on her chest, leaving her immediately.

"He told me to let you decide" she finalised.

"Camilla", he said, tightening his grip around her middle. "You know my feelings. If that trust fund comes into my name, it would feel like stealing from you".

"But it isn't and I know you won't spend it on frivolity".

"I know, but…" he paused. "Camilla, I would walk through fire for you and I have no desire to control you or your money, but I want you to have it. I know I am your husband and I know I am expected to…"

"Rule me with an iron rod?" she inquired.

"I was thinking of a big stick, but yes", he replied.

"What about" she said, a thought suddenly striking, "when this baby is born, when he or she has a name, we speak to Pa about putting the Trust fund into the children's names, under _our_ control. If he'll agree. Would that make you feel better?"

She felt a kiss pressed to the back of her head. "We'll know they will have a roof over their heads when we are long gone so yes, let's do that".


	15. Chapter 15

"Freddie!" Chummy exclaimed, about to reprimand her son. "Don't you dare young man!"

She had caught him, half dressed in a smart pair of trousers and shirt for the wedding, about to take a handful of soil from a large Yucca plant that stood in the corner of their bedroom to put it or toss it God knows where. She could see he was about to throw a wobbler and an eruption was the last thing she needed this morning; soil flying and a screaming toddler.

"No soil otherwise its bathtime again" she said, brushing the offending earth from his hand and leading him away, intending on it being a warning.

"Baf pease!" he replied pending tears turning immediately into an enthusiastic smile. Chummy realised too late it was a daft question. Her son loved his baths, splashing about, soaking his parents and the peril of another dunking was entirely useless. Baths had never been a battle and she was grateful for that but she ought to remember to drill it into her own mind that the threat simply never works.

"Sit down and we need to put your socks and shoes on for the wedding", she said, diverting him "and Mummy is going to take a wet wipe to those hands".

"Socks an' sooes" Freddie repeated. "Socks an' sooes".

A wet wipe was spiriting out of the bottomless handbag that she now seemed to have to carry around with her and a quick swipe seemed to do the trick as he held his hands out for her.

"Socks an' sooes" Freddie repeated again, legs kicking wildly in the air as she lifted him onto the edge of the bed.

Chummy contemplated for a moment. "Do you know Freds, Mummy can't kneel down to put them on as she'll never get back up again and Daddy is in the shower" she noted still hearing running water away to their side.

"But Mummy does know a rather swift resolution to the sock pickle!" she said to herself grabbing hold of his ankles and tipping him backwards so his legs were in the air. Freddie thought it the best game ever, pulling his legs away when she tried to put his socks on to the extent she too found it far too funny and putting on 'socks an' sooes' turned into a major undertaking.

Peter could hear them laughing as he stepped out of the shower and quickly wrapped a towel around his middle, pulling another from the rail to rub over his hair.

"Camilla?"

"Your suit's here" she said, righting Freddie who promptly and not quite deliberately fell backwards again so he was lying on the bed. "Sit up!" she whispered sharply back at him.

"I am!" Peter replied, his voice echoing around the bathroom. "In fact, I think I'm doing something called standing up!"

"Peter! I was talking to your son!" she scolded. "Do you see what I have to put up with?" she whispered to Fred. "Your father is a nightmare!"

She saw a head appear around the door frame. "I know that Camilla".

She was hoping that he had not heard the bit about the nightmare but was referencing that he knew she was talking about Fred who had sat up again, feet dangling over the end of the bed.

"Your hair!" Chummy exclaimed quickly locating a comb and streaking it through the boy's hair as he grimaced. "I know you don't like your hair being combed young man but it's for your own good otherwise Grandpa won't have you on the photographs".

To be truthful her son did not look remotely concerned about whether he was in such a suitable state or not as he continued to turn his head away left and right, mithering at his mother to stop.

"Mumma!" He was about to launch into a display of tears again.

"Do you want me to pin you down?" she asked. He knew what 'pinning down' meant. It usually meant things that tasted horrible.

"We used to do this with the piglets on the farm" Peter had noted, somewhat unhelpfully, when a bath towel had been wrapped around his son's body so there were no interfering hands or arms or flailing legs when his mother had been armed with a dropper of antibiotics. It had broken her heart but no amount of disguising it in banana flavoured milk had resulted in the medicine not being spat out.

It was an empty threat anyway – it was windy this morning and his hair would be a mess regardless and between them, silently, both Chummy and her son gave up the fight after a token effort; on his mother's part to save the tears that were going to flow and Fred on a point of entirely no enthusiasm at all.

"Right that's you as ready as you are going to be young man, and Mummy is ready so we just need to wait for Daddy!"

Just as they were about to remove themselves from the room there was a knock on the door.

Before either parent could open their mouths Freddie shouted "oo um ri'in!"

Peter shot his wife a look. "He's got it off Sister Julienne. She always says, 'do come right in'".

Her father, who was on the other side presumed it was intended to be 'come in' and he pushed the door open gently just in case that whilst grandson might have been entertaining, his daughter and son in law might not be ready to.

"One does hope one is not disturbing" he uttered seeing the coast was clear to actually enter the room.

"No, Pa" Chummy said, turning to him, after helping Fred slide off the bed.

"Good" he replied as the three adults stood in the room, Fred between his parents holding onto the hem of his Dad's jacket.

"One doesn't imagine that we will have much time today to converse but…" he paused, "one was just doing the rounds to say that one hopes that everyone enjoys today and well, that Margaret and me are pleased to have our family around us".

Chummy smiled uncomfortably.

"And.." he carried on, looking more towards Peter than his daughter, "one would like you to know that this door is always open and one hopes that you know you can take up the invitation".

"And you know you can come to Poplar" Peter replied. Sometimes issues had to be forced. It had taken him delivering her mother to her to elicit those hesitant steps and all this avoidance behaviour had to stop. There were higher purposes at hand and he truly believed that his wife knew it.

"I would like to" her father replied. "Margaret has not been back to London for some years and we were thinking of a short sojourn later in the year". He glanced quickly at his daughter who could not meet his eye.

"Let us know" Peter said, seeing what he perceived to be an agreeing nod from his wife, even though he could recognise her mind was racing. "We will also let you know about Camilla's fund". Her father nodded gravely slightly taken aback. Directness, yes; directness.

"Yes you must" her father said.

'I will' were the first croaking words that Chummy uttered, knowing her husband was right but entirely unable to articulate it. As much as she might like to learn that she could converse as father and daughters should something invisible still stood between them that only time would perhaps, however, remedy. She had not had those precious hours and minutes with her mother until the very end and there was so much more to be said to ensure that history failed to repeat itself. She did not wish it to happen twice.

"Now young Freddie" her father said, crouching on the floor to be level with his grandson, knees creaking. Chummy looked at her husband and he shrugged his shoulders. Peter felt the boy shift slightly behind him, standing on his foot on the way.

"Don't be shy Freds" he whispered. "Grandpa is saying hello". His other grandpa, Peter's father, would be regularly mown down by his grandson in eagerness but her father was somewhat different.

"I understand his hesitance" her father noted, looking up at his son in law.

He took a box from his pocket – a small velvet box, worn slightly.

"I'd like you to give this to your Mummy to keep". He took the boys hand, palm up and placed the box on it. Fred had heard the word 'Mummy' and looked towards her blankly. Chummy did not know quite what to do but she took the box from the boy.

Her father stood up. "One must speak to your brothers before we all leave".

He stretched his hand out to Peter, shaking it. What intended to be similar with his daughter ended up as a simple touch of her hand and nothing more said.

"What is it?" Peter asked as the door clicked shut as her father left.

"You open it" she said, thrusting the box into his hand. She thought she recognised the blue velvet covering.

Chummy picked Fred up and sat on the bed and Peter sat too beside them, pushing the small brass hook aside. Opening it up he found a garnet stone set in gold and heard his wife take a sharp breath.

"That's Mater's" she said quietly, grip tightening on Fred. "It was her 18th birthday present from her father. I remember her saying it was the only piece of jewellery that her father gave her that she wore all the time. She didn't have it with her when she came to London and I did wonder why". She took the box from him.

"She must have left it behind when she bolted" she remarked. She must have been in such a hurry, she thought for a moment; so desperate to go that she left something behind that Chummy knew, underneath it all, she cherished.

"He is trying Camilla" Peter noted, voice laced with sympathy.

"I know" she signed before straightening up, wanting to be brave. "I think that we need to invite him home as soon as possible".

Peter smiled.

"Then one thinks that he could, he might, start to understand why I stay where I am. I think he might". She paused, realising that she no longer felt the silly child any more. "I think I'd like him to".

"Good" he replied. She breathed in, filling her lungs as his hand drifted up her cheek pulling her towards him. As the kiss deepened she felt Fred slide off her knee, using Peter's trousers to lever himself down.

She felt Peter break the kiss and his forehead slip to her shoulder.

"If he's heading towards that plant…." Chummy enunciated into her husband's ear, shooting her head around, instead finding her son trying to reach for the door handle of the bedroom.

"Do you think that's a hint he's bored with us and wants to go?" she asked.

Peter smiled. "I think so", he replied. "Fred! Daddy opens the door". His son entirely ignored him and on tip toe he just about managed to grab hold of the brass door handle, but perhaps with not enough grip that it sprang back with the most horrific noise.

"Well at least it's better than he did with our bedroom door at home!" Peter whispered. Chummy pulled a face remembering Fred's many attempts at escaping the clutches of either parent wielding a toothbrush and on one particular episode running headlong into the closed door. She came home to a son sporting a blacking eye and a guilt ridden husband.

Chummy picked Fred up and just as she was about to open the door a thought struck.

"Can I ask you something?" she said.

"You may" Peter replied, pulling the hem of Fred's trousers to a more suitable position.

"No" she said suddenly, shaking her head as she opened the door.

"No", Peter replied, pushing it back closed. "What were you going to ask?"

She looked at him, his eyebrows raised. "Just something George said and it made me think".

"Which was?" She felt his hand go to her elbow.

"When Caroline was sick, he said that you were soft on me".

"Camilla" he started, taking a step towards her. "Do _you_ think I am?"

"You let me do so much" she said, voice soft. A working mother? It was unheard of for a husband to allow it and she had heard the whispers in clinic. Her brother's comment had only served to compound it.

"You're not an object. I don't possess you" he replied. "The only thing I want is for you to be happy. I can't say I objected to you not working but it was my own selfish reasons", he carried on. "When I came home you were always there. Day or night, I'd come home to you and you were there but I did see you missed Nonnatus too".

"But you don't resent me for it?"

She knew there had been the odd flash, the occasional moment where she had seen a look or heard a tone in his voice, but as these months had passed she had learned from it. It wasn't just him. She had to fold somewhere too.

"Camilla, your brothers don't live under our roof and whatever they or your Dad might or might not have said about you or to you in the past, you won't find me repeating it". There were more important things than dinner on the table at six.

"I can't change it can I?" The sooner she realised the better.

"No, but you can move forward" he concluded, giving her elbow another squeeze.

The first thing she did when they got home was write her father a 'thank you' note for inviting them.

It was a start after all.

FIN


End file.
